


heartless by design

by darkavenue



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: F/M, fashion industry drama, gabriel plays himself, i basically copy and pasted that text post about the alpaca in an office into this story, nathalie is a lesbian, nathalie is also ron swanson i guess, nathalie's stoicism in the face of marinette's hysterics, the nathalie/marinette buddy comedy nobody asked for
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-03
Updated: 2016-11-05
Packaged: 2018-08-28 19:20:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 20,700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8459953
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darkavenue/pseuds/darkavenue
Summary: Nathalie closed her eyes and pushed two fingers between her eyebrows. “As you may have noticed, Gabriel is closing in on me viciously. If we are going to get this line manufactured before he shuts every door in our face, the designs need to be finalized in five days or less.”For a few seconds, Marinette could only blink in stunned disbelief. “That’s impossible.”“It better not be.”





	1. Chapter 1

“New fashion houses open up in Paris every month. Many only last a handful of seasons before closing. Even more fail to reach temporary success at all.”

Nathalie Sancoeur spoke to her like she was stupid. They were in her office, all dark wood and bare walls. The lack of any decoration made it more like an interrogation room than a job interview.

“Most indie fashion labels without corporate financing won’t have the money to pay you. The best they can offer is an internship where you get paid in so-called _work experience_ , and they still expect nearly full-time hours—”

“Is this truly an indie company if it’s associated with Gabriel Agreste?” Marinette couldn’t help interrupting. Partially because this question had been on her mind since the second she recognized the woman interviewing her, but mostly because she couldn’t handle being condescended further.

Nathalie raised her eyebrows ever so slightly, and Marinette could swear she saw the exact moment it dawned on her that this candidate didn’t need to be spoon-fed basic facts about the fashion industry. At the very least, this first-year university student was decently informed about who was who.

“It’s not affiliated with Gabriel Agreste in any means.”

“None? It’s just you?” Marinette tried to ask casually, but the massive disappointed slipped through in her voice. In the way her shoulders sagged.

Nathalie pierced her with one look. “ _Just_ me.”

Marinette tried to smile even as she shrank in her seat. She wished Nathalie would point that harsh stare elsewhere, but when it shifted down to examine Marinette’s resume on the desk she found that more frightening than the eye contact.

Black nails tapped the wooden surface at the edge of Marinette’s paper. “You are the youngest candidate to apply to the position, and also the one with the least experience.”

She couldn’t argue that. Marinette had only recently started university.

“Which is why it’s bizarre,” Nathalie continued, “that you should also be the one with the most high profile credentials.”

“I wouldn’t lie on my resume,” Marinette blurted.

“I personally handled your collaboration with Gabriel, I’m well aware of it. I also contacted Jagged Stone’s agent for confirmation and received a very strongly worded testimonial about you.”

“A good one, I hope?”  
  
“Vulgar in expression, but glowing in sentiment.”

Marinette laughed, although the sound quickly petered off when she noticed Nathalie didn’t even crack a smile.

 

* * *

 

Two weeks after the vaguely terrifying interview with Nathalie Sancoeur, Marinette received a callback for the job. She was in her room, wrapped in a towel, naked and afraid.

“Even though you’re an amateur, I think you have potential.” Nathalie spoke tersely, as though the words of praise tasted bitter in her mouth.

 _And you can’t afford to hire professionals on an independent budget anyway,_ Marinette thought, but wouldn’t dare say out loud.

She opted for replying a little more politely, “I’m flattered you think so, but I have to turn the job down.”

“Excuse me?”

“I’ve been offered an internship for another designer… so…” Marinette trailed off, pacing in barefoot circles around the center of her room. Why was Nathalie frightening even over the phone?

“You’re turning a real job down for an _internship_? Listen.” Nathalie flattened her voice as flat as it could go before admitting, “You could be promoted to a Creative Director position in this company before you turn 21 if you earn it.”

“Uh!” was the incredibly embarrassing reaction Marinette had to that.

Nathalie didn’t say anything, just to make sure Marinette felt frazzled in the awkward pause.

“That would be amazing, and I really appreciate your faith in me, but—The internship is for Gabriel Agreste.”

“What.”

“His assistant—uh, the new one, I guess?—reached out to me personally. She said he’s been keeping an eye on me since I won his contest.”

A long pause on the other end of the line.

“Hello?”

“You would rather spend a year picking up Gabriel’s coffee than actually designing?”

Marinette chewed her lip. _No, but…_ “He’s my favorite designer, not to mention how competitive applying for his internships must be, and I’d be getting paid, so I really can’t pass up the chance and I already accepted it on the spot. Sorry, Madame Sancoeur.”

 

* * *

 

“So that’s the wild week I had,” Marinette told Jagged Stone. “Thanks for giving her a _glowing_ recommendation for me anyway.”

She was on her knees in his hotel room, looking at his bare thighs. The situation was nowhere near as sexually charged as one would hope.

“I told her Marinette ‘ _fucking’_ rocks. She’s got edge and she knows what’s ‘ _badass_.’ You can ask her to make any wild idea for a design and it’ll be ‘ _the shit_ ,’ guaranteed,” Jagged rained praise on her in his trademark Frenglish.

His latest whim for a stage outfit was a pair of pants that were also garters. It wasn’t the strangest thing he’d commissioned Marinette to make for him. She sat back on her haunches to analyze the fit. She’d started by making a pair of vinyl shorts, then separate trouser legs that started a couple of inches above his knee. The final step was attaching a thin strip of the same material down the center of each thigh, connecting the pieces.

“Well, there you have ‘em. Pants that are also lingerie. They actually look good!” Marinette couldn’t help sounding surprised.  

“ _Sexy_ ,” Jagged growled to his own reflection in English.

His manager circled around Jagged to eye him up and down. After some consideration, she hummed in approval. “It’s risky, it’s sultry. Good call, Jagged. The style magazines will have a field day.”

With a fiendish grin, Jagged tried out various poses in the mirror. “Always know I can take a gamble on you, Marinette. It’s gonna be a waste to have you making Agreste’s coffee.”

Marinette laughed. “It’s worth it to observe a master at work.”

“You don’t learn by watching, you learn by just jumping in there and ‘ _doing it_.’” Jagged paused, arching his back with one hand caressing the back of his neck and the other poised above his head.

“Make a fist,” Penny muttered, leaning her side against the mirror’s frame.

Jagged curled the fingers of his hand held in the air. “Ooh, yes, that’s powerful.”

Marinette frowned. “You think I should have taken the indie job?”

“ _Oh yeah_ ,” Jagged answered in English, staring intently at his reflection, tilting his head at various angles. “Rock’s all about saying ‘ _fuck you’_ to the big corps.”

Penny clicked her tongue. “Forget that Jagged Stone’s entire lifestyle is funded by corporations. But you said that woman used to be his assistant?”

Marinette nodded.

Penny mirrored her nod and went on, “It might be naive to think it’s a coincidence Gabriel Agreste personally selected you to work for him the same week his ex-assistant chose to hire you for her new brand.”

Marinette frowned harder. “What do you mean?”

Jagged dropped his pose to leap to her defense. “Marinette is talented ‘ _as fuck!_ ’ They oughta be squabbling over who she gets to work for.”

“I agree, Jag,” Penny said. “But you know fashion is as cutthroat as the music world. What would our label do if I quit tomorrow and tried to start my own independently?”

“They’d poach the musicians you planned to sign… Oh.” Jagged spun to look at Marinette with concern. “He totally wants to steal you.”

It was fortunate Marinette hadn’t risen from her crouching position on the carpet, because this realization might have toppled her. He didn’t actually care about Marinette’s accomplishments. He only wanted to take something from Nathalie. She’d been so proud to hear that Gabriel Agreste himself had chosen her. It was a dream come true. Literally, she had daydreamed about this exact scenario since she was young. She slumped on the plush floor, letting the implications wash over her.

“But I’m not hers to steal,” Marinette argued pathetically to no one in particular.

Jagged Stone knelt down and took her by the shoulders. “Don’t let him use you! Give him the ‘ _middle finger’_ and walk away with the nobody who actually appreciates your work.”

“Don’t give her bad advice, she’s just looking out for own career.” Penny crossed her arms behind him. “You did the smart thing taking the internship with a big name designer. It looks better on paper and you don’t want to get involved in a rivalry with someone that influential.”

“He can’t handle his former assistant rising to power on her own! He wants to keep her shackled to his brand. That’s why it’s called a ‘ _brand_ ,’ like what they put on slaves. It’s anti-feminist _and_ racist, what he’s doing. Are you gonna stand for that, Penny?”

Penny grimaced, pinching the bridge of her nose. “I hated everything you just said, I’m going to put that on the table for you to think about and choose to focus on Marinette right now. She’s obviously great, but she’s not going anywhere in the industry if her first step is making enemies in high places. Gabriel Agreste could sink any rising brand with a snap of his fingers, so if he doesn’t want his ex-assistant to succeed without him—she’s never going to.”

“More reason to do it! It’s a huge ‘ _fuck you’_ to the assholes who think they have authority! If the indie brand bombs, you can say you went down making a stand against the power. ‘ _That’s_ _rock’n’roll_.’”

Jagged and Penny bickered back and forth over whether Marinette should make decisions based on what is most strategic or what is most awesome until they’d forgotten she was still in the room with them. She tossed in the swells of their disagreement, painfully aware that she would be nothing more than a pawn in either situation.

 

* * *

 

Two weeks later, she had turned down both jobs and resigned herself to a life of working in a bakery. Adrien Agreste came in on a slow afternoon. Just waltzed right in there and said “Hey,” like it’s no big deal.

“Adrien, what are you? Why?” Marinette fell into that good old habit of losing her goddamn mind in front of him.

“I’m…” Adrien hesitated to answer, appearing confused and slightly offended by whatever Marinette was asking. “Just stopping by. Hoping I’d see you here.”

“What do you want?” Jesus, that came out a lot snappier than intended.

He raised his eyebrows, taken aback.

“Sorry, no, I meant what do you want?” With rigid flails of her arms, she gestured to the pastries on display.

Adrien didn’t even look at them. “I mean, I’ll take a coffee. But I mainly want to have a chat with you.”

Marinette's hand tapped her chest. “Wha—When?”

He pressed his hips against his side of the counter and his hands on the surface, leaning toward her with a smile far warmer than it had any right to be. “I was really hoping now.”

Marinette took a step back, intimidated by how many details of his face she could notice up close. “Oh, I’d love that, but I’m really busy. Can’t really, right now.”

Keeping his palms on the counter, Adrien’s head turned to look over his shoulder at the bakery ( _Hello, jawline_ ). It was completely empty. Not a soul inside besides her and him. When he faced Marinette again, he didn’t say a word. Just gave her a knowing look.

She didn’t say anything either. Just occupied herself with making his coffee. She kept fumbling, dropping things, knocking cups and containers over. Sensing his eyes on her the entire time only made her more tense.

“Are you nervous because you turned down my father?” he asked during the abnormally long time to make one cafe au lait.

“Should I be?” Marinette stole a glance at him out of the corner of her eye.

He was still leaning over the counter now, with his elbows resting atop and his wrists dangling over her side of it. “I don’t know. Being rejected by a student was definitely a first for him.”

A pang of regret over her decision hit her. Adrien laughed softly.

Marinette’s mood swung low enough for her to narrow her eyes at him. “Thanks, I don’t need anyone rubbing it in to know that was stupid of me.”

“No, it wasn’t that, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to laugh, you just did something funny for a second.”

“Did what?”

“Oh? Nothing. I really don’t think it was stupid at all, I’m glad you said no.”

His smile was playful, and Marinette knew enough about him to trust that cruelty wasn’t his idea of fun. It was not like Adrien to arrive at her doorstep to rub it in. She knew this. But a conversation about his father would sting like salt on her freshly wounded pride. She rang his drink up and offered to make plans to talk later.

“No worries, I can wait around until you’re not so busy.”

With a wink so nonchalant that Marinette would have missed it if she weren’t staring at him in disbelief, he pushed himself up from his elbows and carried his foam cup to a bistro table for two by the window.

She watched him from behind the pastry displays for a couple of minutes. Adrien sipped his coffee and occasionally cast a smile in her direction. She’d never known him to be tenacious like this.

Five minutes passed. No new customers came. She watched him scroll through his phone. The way he sat with one ankle over his knee, idly slumped _just_ enough to look relaxed, but not sloppy—Was he posing?

Ten minutes passed. He didn’t say anything to her. His cup was empty, but he stayed there. Still scrolling. Still posing.

It was all too calculated. Marinette needed to know what was so important about her backing out. She torn off her apron and stomped to the corner table with arms crossed. “So how much do you know about the internship situation?”

“I’m pretty involved in both sides of it.” With his easy smile, Adrien used the tip of his shoe to push the chair across from him out. “How much do _you_ know?”

Marinette took the silently offered seat. “I suspect your dad only wanted to hire me so that Nathalie couldn’t have me.”

“And you chose Nathalie over him.”

“No. I rejected both of them.”

A line appeared between his brows as they nearly snapped together. “Why?”

Her elbows dropped to the table, rattling it, and she bowed her head to rest the temple on her fingertips. She’d thought endlessly over all the reasons why. “It’s messy, the stakes are too high, I don’t want to be involved in this drama as the first step of my fashion career.”

“Every job in fashion will be dramatic. The entire culture of haute couture was built on drama. Oh god, I sound like my dad now.”

Marinette peeked up through her fingers to find that Adrien had followed her lead and also let his face fall into his hands. She laughed, thinking about what they must look like to pedestrians catching sight of them through the window.

“I’m sorry I won’t be working with you. It would have been really great, but your dad is going to find someone just as good as me in a blink.”

Adrien raised his head. “No, I’m _glad_ you turned down the internship. Nathalie told me she interviewed someone from my graduating class. When I found out it was you, I put in a really good word.”

“You—Oh? What did you say?”

He cast his eyes downward and pointed a demure smile at his coffee cup. “I’m not prepared to answer that without it being embarrassing. You did so many amazing things from such a young age, I really thought Nathalie would accomplish something great with someone like you on her side.”

Marinette felt a rush of warmth in her face. “You’re, uh, that close to Madame Sancoeur?”

“I love Nathalie.” Adrien raised his eyes to say it, as unabashed and factual as if he’d told Marinette he loves coffee.

Lucky her, then. Marinette had seen Nathalie around Adrien enough times to assume that she worked closely together with him as well as his father, but somehow it still caught her by surprise to find out they were on that level. The idea that Nathalie could be on that level with anyone was surprising.

“It’s no big secret that my dad’s offended she quit to establish her own thing,” Adrien continued. “Nathalie stuck her neck out for me too many times for me to act like anything between her and him is none of my business. I’d do anything to help her, but I’m on a tight leash here. I don’t have the option to leave the brand, ever.”

As he spoke, something brushed over Marinette’s knuckles. It was Adrien’s fingertips, sliding into her hand and squeezing gently. A tender, sweet gesture. Marinette was not prepared to handle this. She forgot to listen to whatever he was saying until he squeezed her hand again, tighter this time, to get her attention.

“I know this is a really insane favor to ask from a friend,” he said with deliberate slowness and aching sincerity. “I know it is. I’ll owe you so much, I swear I’ll do absolutely anything you ask at any time.”

 _Jesus._ The pale pink of Adrien’s bottom lip disappeared between his teeth when he sucked it in, still holding her hand in his.

She was only human.

Next Monday at nine in the morning, Marinette found herself staring at the door to the office where she’d had her first interview. Nervous that, somehow, she was unwelcome here after flip-flopping between Nathalie and Gabriel Agreste. When Marinette agreed to do this favor for Adrien, he promised he would talk to both sides for her. He would tell Mr. Agreste that Marinette couldn’t do the internship and he would tell Nathalie that she had changed her mind. It was a relief that he offered to do this part for her, since both conversations would have been shameful.

As a result of Adrien relaying between them and Marinette, she hadn’t spoken to Nathalie before this moment. She knocked right beneath a plaque that read _Nathalie Sancoeur, CEO_. It hadn’t been there last time.

 

* * *

 

Marinette liked to think she was expert in handling herself when dealt a wild card. Years of being Ladybug conditioned her to roll with unpredictable variables. This one, however, left her floored.

Nathalie Sancoeur with her hair pulled back tight, with her turtleneck pantsuit, with her perpetually glum face. Yes, _that_ Nathalie Sancoeur. She hired Marinette to design _lingerie_.

“Any questions,” Nathalie asked when she was done presenting her binder of initial designs, workflow, and concepts.

“ _Why?_ ” tumbled out of Marinette’s gaping mouth before she could stop herself.

“Why what.”

“Not to be rude, but…” It was hard to find the right wording beneath Nathalie’s severe stare. “I didn’t—think you—I mean—Isn’t that a bit too risqué… for you?”

Nathalie’s face did not move.

“Not that I don’t think you can be sexy, for an older woman, I just—Oh, wow, that’s inappropriate—” Marinette laughed nervously, hoping Nathalie could at least be amused at the human trainwreck on the other side of her desk.

Nathalie’s face remained unmoved. Marinette’s laughter died off, buried in a grave of awkward.

“Sorry. Just. I was expecting clothing. A line of business attire, or eveningwear, or something.” _Something suitably stuffy_ , she meant to say.

“You are aware that Gabriel has a line of suits for men and women. He has a line of evening wear. He has casual and athletic wear. The Gabriel brand can produce nearly anything for every season.”

Oh! Marinette saw where she was going with this. “But it could never release lingerie. It’s not his style at all. I could have sworn he’s made men’s underwear before, though.”

Nathalie shrugged one shoulder. “Even plain black briefs borders on _a bit too risqué_ for him. He would never go further, much less into women’s. If he did try, it would certainly be critiqued as out of character.”

 _It seems out of character for_ your _style too_ , Marinette said in her head where Nathalie couldn’t hear her.

“So… Sancoeur is going to be a lingerie line because it’s the only place Mr. Agreste can’t compete against you.”

Nathalie gave one short nod. “He has his claws sunk into every other market the fashion industry has. The lingerie is what we need to safely get off the ground, and then we can expand once Sancoeur is a reputable name. Obviously, in order to succeed despite his efforts, the lingerie designs must be remarkable.”

The binder on the desk between them was left open to rough sketches of Nathalie’s concepts. Rudimentary as the first drafts were, it was clear that Nathalie had a stylistic direction. Her aesthetic was bold, artistic—Nothing like the kind of bra you’d wear under a t-shirt. They looked cool, but Marinette wouldn’t call the ideas _remarkable_.

“That’s why I need a designer,” Nathalie supplied, as if she’d read Marinette’s thoughts. “I have the vision, the connections, and professional experience, but not the creative training. From what your references tell me, your strengths are designing within assigned styles and assembling samples under tight deadlines. Mine are management and development.”

Marinette rubbed her bottom lip, fighting off a bad feeling in her gut. “Um. Who are the intended market?”

“Doesn’t matter. Just make something groundbreaking and I will revolutionize the industry.”

“That’s… pretty ambitious.”  
  
“I’m very good at the industry.”

Marinette supposed she had to be, and wondered how much of Gabriel's success could be attributed to Nathalie's skills. She directed Marinette to her work station, a table at the center of the common area outside of her office. There were five other desks lined along the walls, currently empty. The walls were white and bare, giving the same prison-like feeling as the inside of her new boss’ office. She spent the day sifting through Nathalie’s binder, taking down notes and brainstorming. The concept for Sancoeur was based on bold geometrics. Sharp angles, excessive straps, unusual cutouts everywhere. It was an unconventional choice that looked more intimidating than inviting.

At the end of the day, a phone hanging from a column beside Marinette’s desk rang in her ear. After a jump scare, Marinette answered with fake composure. “Hello?”

“Come to my office. Bring what you have so far.”

“I—” Nathalie hung up.

Shit. Marinette took a deep breath, collecting her notes. She read her ideas out loud to Nathalie, while pacing before her desk. Mostly improvements on Nathalie’s initial sketches, design elements that would take the aesthetic in a softer, more feminine direction.  

“That’s it?” Nathalie asked after a long pause at the end of Marinette’s presentation.

She nodded uncertainly. She thought it had been good progress. Nathalie closed her eyes and pushed two fingers between her eyebrows.

“As you may have noticed, Gabriel is closing in on me viciously. If we are going to get this line manufactured before he shuts every door in our face, the designs need to be finalized in five days or less.”

For a few seconds, Marinette could only blink in stunned disbelief. “That’s impossible.”

“It better not be.”

 

* * *

 

Two minutes after Marinette stepped out of her new work building, her phone vibrated in her pocket. A text from an unfamiliar number read: _Hey! I wanna know how your first day was. Can I meet you at the bakery? - Adrien._

She replied with a simple _Yes_ , but a few things about this rubbed her the wrong way. Did he get a new number between yesterday and today? How did he know she just got out of work? Did Nathalie tell him to ask her? Lord. This entire situation had her so paranoid.

Adrien was already at the bakery when she arrived, leaning on the counter with a coffee in hand and talking to her dad.

“There she is,” her father announced as Marinette came around the counter to give him a tired hug. “How was day one?”

“Alright,” Marinette lied, stealing a croissant and grabbing Adrien by the elbow. “Mostly just getting acquainted with the company, nothing much happened.”

“What kind of work do they have you—” Her dad paused, seeing Marinette dragging Adrien up the stairs with a pastry in her mouth.

“I’ll ‘ell you la’er!” She promised before shutting the door behind her.

“So your first day went okay?” Adrien said with a bright smile.

She removed the croissant. “No!”

His face fell so fast it would have been comedic, if Marinette was in any mood for that.

“She wants to have a trunk show a month from now. We don’t even have _designs_ yet!”

The way Adrien’s eyes widened betrayed his fake calm when he answered, “Nathalie knows what she’s doing. You don’t need to worry about anything but making the clothes.”

“Oh, no pressure, just the clothes, which are the entire focal point of the whole company. They’re not even clothes!” Marinette took a frustrated bite of croissant.

“Huh? How’s it not clothes?”

“What, she didn’t tell you either? Sancoeur is going to be a lingerie line.”

Adrien touched the base of his neck, scandalized. “I'm sorry, what? _Nathalie?”_

Marinette nodded with a small smile, comforted that someone who considered himself close to Nathalie found it as surprising as she did. “It’s really weird. On that note, what’s the number you texted me from?”

His response was delayed, probably taking a moment trying to wrap his mind around what the hell Nathalie was doing. “Oh, right. That’s my driver’s number. I use it to talk to Nathalie. And you now, since you’re in her company.”

She raised an eyebrow. “You need to talk to us through your driver’s phone?”

Adrien shrugged helplessly. “So my dad doesn’t see your numbers on my phone bill. He’d be angry if he knew how much I’m helping you out.”

“That’s fucked up, Adrien.”

He looked off to the side, clearly upset. She hadn't meant to touch a nerve, so Marinette quickly covered it up by adding playful comment. “Unless you can design some lingerie for me, you’re not even that helpful.”

“That’s not my forte, but I’ll model some for you if it’s inspiring.” Adrien laughed. Marinette sweated.


	2. Chapter 2

Working for Nathalie Sancoeur was as rewarding as getting punched in the face. Maybe Marinette preferred a punch to the face. It would be a relief from the avalanches of passive aggression that filled her nine to five life. At the end of each day, Marinette presented design sketches to be approved or denied. Nathalie only had criticism for her, every single time.

“What about these?” Marinette slid a pair of drawings under Nathalie’s nose. “Any comments?”

Her boss had looked at them earlier for a couple of minutes before piling them to the side without a word. Marinette knew they were damn good. They were her favorites.

Nathalie studied them again, expressionless. “If I thought there was a problem, I would have mentioned it.”

“You like them, don’t you?”

“They are adequate for the trunk show,” she said with a tone of finality, setting her mouth in a firm line.

 _Would a little praise kill you?!_ Marinette wanted to say. She couldn’t say it, because she liked getting paid to do what she loved. Less than what Gabriel Agreste would have been paying her for less work, though, so she gave Nathalie a look that she hoped would convey it.

Marinette was proud of the pieces she’d designed in the first four days, but none of them were something she’d consider groundbreaking. She was creatively drained by the time the fifth day rolled around, the end of Nathalie’s deadline, and spent half of her work hours slumped over a blank white sheet. Anxiety over the time crunch made it more difficult to come up with ideas. Behind her, she could hear Nathalie’s voice within her office. She was on the phone, calling venues to talk about pricing for the night of the fashion show. The show that had no pieces made yet. Marinette dug a pair of headphones out of her purse and drowned out Nathalie’s conversation with Jagged Stone’s guitar.

His new album was fantastic. Marinette mouthed the words she knew by heart, bringing her pencil to paper for the first time that day. When particularly good riffs came, Marinette would pause her doodling to air guitar. Distantly, she heard a ring.

Marinette tugged her headphones down to rest around her neck. The phone by her desk rang. She answered.

“Don’t do that,” Nathalie ordered.

Marinette pivoted around. Through the open door of Nathalie’s office, she could see her boss holding a phone to her ear less than thirty feet away. “Listen to music?”

“The music is fine. It’s what you’re doing that needs to stop immediately.”

The air guitar? This was ridiculous. Marinette couldn’t believe they were having a phone conversation while looking each other in the eye. “You really have a control complex.”  
  
“I’m skilled at micro-management,” Nathalie corrected.

Marinette rolled her eyes. “No, you’re creepy for watching me behind my back!”

“I have a keen eye for small details.”

Marinette slammed the phone back on its hook. On her work table, the rough illustration of Jagged Stone smirked up at her. A pair of footsteps approached behind her.

“What do you have for me?”

“Nothing!” she cried out. “I’ve got nothing!”

“You’re being hysterical,” Nathalie intoned, unmoved by Marinette’s spasms.

Marinette was well aware of her voice rising, but she resented Nathalie’s deadpan condescension, so she dialed up the hysterics out of spite. “I’m _sorry?_ Do _emotions_ bother you? This deadline was impossible and you _know_ it! You set me up for failure from the start and I—”

“You can do this.”

“And _you_ can go f—What.”

Marinette couldn’t have heard that correctly. She thought she heard Nathalie say something encouraging.

“After you draft the designs, I’ll assign a team you can delegate work to. It will be easier than this first week of crunching.” Nathalie circled around her to examine Marinette’s work for the day.

All she had was a doodle of Jagged Stone. She braced herself for a reprimand.

Nathalie’s crimson fingertips traced across the garters on Jagged’s thighs.

“This is perfect."

Those three words hit Marinette with the same glee that a mountain of praise from anyone else would.

 

* * *

 

“One problem,” she lamented through a mouthful of cookies that evening. “It’s not my design.”

Her legs were splayed out across the floor, her hands penciling patterns onto broad sheets of paper between them. Adrien sat cross-legged at her side, cutting out the ones she had already completed.

“The pants were Jagged Stone’s idea?”

“Yeah, and Nathalie immediately moved the project to the next phase. She’s already hiring more people to get this thing rolling. She’s going to kill me when I tell her the best design for the fashion show is unusable.” With a groan, Marinette dropped. Her back hit the wooden floor with a dull thud.

“You don’t know that,” Adrien said. “You haven’t even asked him. He might be okay with it.”

She turned her head to the side to look at him. From her position on the floor she could only see his back, hunched in concentration. The movements of his shoulderblades were visible beneath his shirt as he trimmed around her designs methodically.

“It’s not Jagged Stone I’m worried about.” Marinette threw the back of her palm over her eyes to block Adrien’s motions from distracting her. “What if we can’t afford his royalties? What if Nathalie doesn’t want to negotiate a partnership with anyone? What if she thinks I tried to steal his idea? I’m not a plagiarist!”

He laughed quietly. “You’re overthinking it. Just explain things to her.”

“Like it’s that easy.”

The sound of snipping paused. The soft rattle of scissors placed on the floor, then his clothes rustling. Marinette pulled her arm away from her face and saw green eyes directly above her.

Adrien leaned over her with a small, delighted smile. “Are you afraid of Nathalie?”

She exhaled a noisy, indignant breath. “Uh, she is terrifying. It’s a fact.”

“Ha!”

“ _Hey_.” Marinette pushed herself up on her elbows. “Just because you developed an immunity from exposure—” Her forehead brushed against his chin on her way up. “—Oh—I—It’s—” What had she been saying?

“Sorry,” Adrien said, pulling back to sit on his knees. “I know she’s cold.”

Understatement.

“But one time,” he went on, “Nathalie rented a van and drove two hours out of Paris to bring an alpaca back from a ranch and left it in our driveway.”

She had no idea why he was telling her this. “Did your dad ask her for an alpaca?”

“He told her to order an alpaca coat. She didn’t hear that last bit, but she was too scared of my dad to question why he would need an alpaca. So what I’m trying to tell you is—Marinette, listen—”

She was laughing too loud to hear the moral of that story. She didn’t need it. After that night, whenever Nathalie pulled intimidation tactics on her, Marinette thought of the alpaca.

She repeated the word alpaca alpaca alpaca alpaca in her mind like a mantra on the next work day, when she told Nathalie the garter pants were Jagged Stone’s design.

“Are you serious,” Nathalie said, with a dull snap to her voice. It was the angriest she had ever sounded. “I’m already making contracts with the textile manufacturer for that design’s fabric.”

“But you haven’t signed them?” Marinette asked hopefully.

“It’s the only manufacturer who has a grudge against Gabriel, and thus the only one who will work with us. We cannot afford to displease her at any cost. We need to be her best fucking friends.”

Remember the alpaca. “She can’t be the _only_ one.”

“You underestimate Gabriel’s influence.”

“But, like, how would they know? I doubt he’s going to every single person in the textile industry to talk smack about us.”

Nathalie rolled her eyes for a moment, quick as a flicker. “You don’t know about his vastly disproportionate sense of retribution either.”

 

* * *

 

Nathalie ordered Marinette to draft a better design using the same materials, due next morning at nine. Marinette thought feverishly of the alpaca, and decided not to do that.

When she knocked at her office, the reply behind it was a cold, “You’re two hours late.”  
  
Marinette cracked the door open and poked her head in. “Sorry, it was really hard to get him out of bed this early.”

It swung open the rest of the way to reveal a tall, gorgeous rockstar behind her. The effect was lessened by Jagged Stone’s baggy, scoop-necked pajama shirt, the Starbucks in his hand, and the sunglasses he wore indoors. Also by Fang curiously poking his nose in between Marinette’s ankles before she got to do the big reveal. Still, Nathalie’s eyebrows shot up and her lips parted in a short gasp. An emotion clearly written on her face! Marinette took it as a small victory. Before she could make a single gloating comment about it, Nathalie rose from her seat to greet Jagged with full composure.

“Mr. Stone, I’m honored to have you here. I wish my associate had given notice ahead of time.” She fired a sharp look at Marinette. (Alpaca.)

It didn’t go unnoticed by Jagged. “No, she’s cool. We run on the _‘rock clock._ ’”

He tossed an arm around Marinette’s shoulder and leaned toward Nathalie. Nathalie took a miniscule step back. Holy shit. She was intimidated. Jagged wasn’t even making sense and she wasn’t freezing him out the way she would treat Marinette. A short head of purple pushed into the room from behind Jagged, stepping in to act as his interpreter and link to reality.

“Excuse him, he’s only on his second coffee. It takes three to get him functional,” Penny apologized. Although, Marinette could have sworn Jagged Stone was always like this.

Nathalie’s eyes darted between the three of them, before settling on Penny. “Are you his assistant? Miss…?”

“Rolling. And no, I’m his manager.” Penny grinned like a cat bearing its teeth. “I own this guy.”

Jagged confirmed with one quick nod. Marinette had a feeling her boss was sizing up the situation and concluding that she was the lowest on the food chain in this room. Except for Marinette, of course. But Marinette was the adorable piglet that wandered into the wrong zoo exhibit and got adopted by a tigress. Nathalie wouldn’t be mean to her in front of Mama Tiger Jagged. She eyed the trio without saying a word.

“About the garters,” Marinette proposed, “I told Jagged Stone about the misunderstanding—which I’m very sorry about—” she tilted her head back to look up at him and Jagged cracked a smile that Marinette contagiously mirrored when she faced Nathalie again, “And he’s willing to consider a collaboration with your brand.”

Marinette had hooked it _up_. Marinette was the Sancoeur line’s saving grace.

Nathalie’s face remained completely inscrutable in the face of this amazing news. Marinette’s hands balled into fists.

“Very generous of you, but I could not possibly afford it,” Nathalie told Penny.

“They know that!” Marinette said louder than originally intended.

“Yeah, Marinette has _thoroughly_ briefed us on the situation,” said Penny. “We are willing to reach a compromise that’s realistic for a nascent brand.”

Nathalie crossed her arms. “Why.”

“Because you’re fucking shit up against impossible odds and that’s ‘ _badass_.’” Jagged Stone crumpled his empty foam cup in one fist and tossed it towards the garbage bin at the corner of Nathalie’s desk. It missed.

“Jagged’s been entertaining the idea of producing clothing and accessories for a while now,” Penny explained. “Marinette happens to be the aspiring designer he feels most comfortable executing his ideas with, so it’s worthwhile to help even the odds for her success while she’s in Gabriel Agreste’s line of fire.”

“That too,” Jagged added.

Marinette bounced on the balls of her feet, thrilled to receive some admiration to make up for Nathalie’s lack thereof.

Penny’s hand slipped into the pocket of her leather jacket and came out with a business card between two fingers. She offered it to Nathalie. “We could discuss the fine details of the contract over dinner. Eight PM tonight?”

Penny smiled warmly as Nathalie took the card. This seemed to piss Nathalie off somehow. “No. We can have ten AM coffee. I don’t do dinner.”

Penny’s eyebrows went up. “Everyone has dinn—Okay, fine. Tomorrow, at twelve, over _lunch_.”

Nathalie waited a beat before agreeing with a curt, “Right.”

“Call me tonight to confirm,” Penny said with a conspiratorial wink.

 

* * *

 

She spent the week making mock-ups of the designs Nathalie selected, trying to find a method that was fast enough to meet their tight deadlines without being sloppy. She built the toiles on a model, where she could examine the fit on a moving body and make necessary adjustments. Marinette always liked this part of the process—Building a sample of the completed piece and working out the issues that hadn’t been foreseen on paper. There were few things more satisfying than experimenting with solutions and resolving a problem with the fit that she initially had no idea how to tackle.

Nathalie selected the two models Marinette would be working on; A strangely quiet older woman for the majority and a nineteen year old who called himself Sly, and was always late, for Jagged Stone’s design. She ordered Marinette not to mention anything about Gabriel Agreste in front of them.

“You think they don’t know about the situation with my dad?” Adrien asked over coffee.

Marinette frowned. “Definitely not. It feels wrong using them when they don’t know they’re at risk of being blacklisted just for associating with us.”

“ _Nathalie_ ,” he sighed. “She’s never been one for ethics in business, sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologize for her.”

The best perks of the new job were visits from Adrien at least once a week. Sometimes more. He would come to the bakery to split a pastry with her, or play games on the couch, or lend a hand in her room if she had brought any work home. One week, his schedule couldn’t align with Marinette’s free time, so he came to her university to keep her company during a studio class.

It was obvious he couldn’t care this much about weekly updates on the Sancoeur line. He could call Nathalie to ask how she’s doing if it was all he wanted to know. He didn’t _need_ to spend this much time with Marinette. Her breath quickened at the thought.

“At least the ball is rolling, right? I can’t believe you’re making samples already.”

“Yeah, it’s rolling. Terrifyingly fast. Chasing me down a tight tunnel.”

Adrien laughed. “You’re actually meeting Nathalie’s impossible expectations, though. I knew you’d be good for her.”

“I don’t know if Nathalie agrees.”

"You don’t know Nathalie. She hasn’t fired you. That means she thinks you’re great.” He clasped his hand over hers to give it a comforting squeeze. 

Is that how it was?

She had to toile each bra and panty about eight times before Nathalie was satisfied with the fit and the movement. Eleven times for Jagged Stone’s garter design, which she had altered to be silk instead of vinyl. When Nathalie approved them, Marinette received nothing whatsoever in congratulations. No compliments on her work, or her speed. When she had no criticism of a garment, Nathalie only said “ _This one can move to the next stage,”_ and that was it.

Halfway through explaining this to Adrien, Marinette noticed him tense up in his seat.

“Oh, no. Mingyar’s here.” His eyes were fixed on something outside.

Mingyar appeared to be a woman standing on the sidewalk, wearing her black hair pulled back into a long, wavy ponytail. Through the bakery windows, she gave Adrien a sweet smile and a wave with her fingers.

Marinette waved too. “Is that the new assistant? She seems nice.”

“She’s much worse,” Adrien mumbled as he got up. “I have to go.”

Marinette followed him out of the bakery. Mingyar’s face was, frankly, dazzling up close. She could have been a model.  

The gold bangles at her wrists clinked gently as she typed on her cellphone. “Adrien, you were scheduled to arrive home forty minutes ago.”

“I stopped to get something to eat. How did you know I—?”

“Your father can see your phone’s location.” She didn't look up from her phone.

“Of course he can.” With a resigned wave goodbye to Marinette, Adrien got into the black car waiting for him on the curb.

Mingyar turned her glittering smile to Marinette. Her teeth were so white.

“Hi, I’m—”  
  
“Marinette Dupain-Cheng. I thought you would be older.”

“Well, Adrien and I were in the same—”

“Gabriel’s offer is still on the table, you know. He told me to let you know that.”  
  
“The internship?”

“A letter of recommendation from Gabriel can get you absolutely anything you want in the fashion world. You realize that? It’s not too late to choose the right side.” The woman put a hand on Marinette’s shoulder.

“I don’t think—”

“Gabriel wants to help you. And you would see Adrien every day. You’re on the verge of losing everything because of Nathalie Sancoeur, who doesn’t care about you. Or anyone.”

Marinette paused for a long moment, then shrugged off Mingyar’s hand. “You don’t know Nathalie.”

Mingyar giggled. It didn’t sound happy or amused. It was only the replication of what laughter sounds like. “Do you?”

No. Marinette didn’t, at all. She looked past Mingyar, into the car. Adrien smiled at her behind the window. Marinette was regurgitating his words about Nathalie, trusting his belief that somewhere deep, deep, deep down, Nathalie had something resembling a heart.

She crossed her arms and told Mingyar the one thing she did know. “I know Mr. Agreste is bending over backwards to block her from accomplishing this without him and he is failing. Repeatedly. If the weight of Gabriel Agreste’s influence isn’t enough to crush Nathalie now, she’s going to rip control of the industry right out of his hands when her name becomes a brand.”

Mingyar’s smile slipped right off her glowing face. “Well then. Gabriel also asked me to tell you that, even though what Nathalie’s doing is a despicable form of betrayal, there are no hard feelings.”

“What.”

“Gabriel’s only concern is protecting Adrien from associating with dishonorable manipulators, and he sincerely hopes this new brand of Nathalie’s doesn’t collapse into a massive disaster that annihilates both of your careers. Understood?”

Marinette had no words.

 

* * *

 

It was hard to go a minute without thinking about the promise of failure, or the magnitude of its consequences.

Nathalie hired an assistant to help Marinette do the remaining technical work. Making spec sheets for garments to be constructed in a factory was the most time-consuming step of the design process. It was crucial not to make a single mistake either, or every piece they paid to manufacture would come out with that mistake. This would be an inconvenient time for Nathalie to call Marinette into her office and assign her to a different task. Which was exactly what Nathalie did.

She set up fifteen meetings in one week with various press and talent agencies. Marinette followed her to each of them. They were hand delivering invitations to the trunk show and trying to collect RSVPs. Everyone had declined so far.

“If there’s no press and no celebrities at the event, we’re basically showcasing to no one,” Marinette whined outside the elevator for the last meeting.

“I am aware.”

Two weeks ago, Marinette would have thought Nathalie looked unruffled by her failures. But she was getting a hang of the ways Nathalie expressed her feelings, when she had them. When they were asked to take a seat in the waiting room, Marinette caught Nathalie fidgeting with her phone, scrolling aimlessly through messages.

“Why did you string me along for this?” She asked in an angry hush.

“Penny thought it would make a better impression,” her boss whispered back.

“Well, it didn’t!”

“You don’t say. Lower your voice.”

This was it. This was the end. They were crashing and burning, collapsing into a massive disaster that would annihilate both their careers. 

“Why’d you quit working for Mr. Agreste?”

Nathalie hesitated to answer. “That’s a personal question.”

“You don’t say,” Marinette mirrored in a tone that earned her an icy stare from Nathalie.

The receptionist called them into the meeting. “Alec is ready for you.”

Alec was only a TV host, only considered a celebrity because his face is recognizable from television. He had little following and little influence. He was their last hope.

“That sounds smokin’ hot, but I can’t be there.”

Beside her, Nathalie exhaled heavily through her nostrils.

“Why?” Marinette asked. A rude question, but nothing was left to lose for today.

“Uhhh.” He rejected them in a heartbeat, but  couldn’t say the reason without thinking about it. He settled on, “I have a prior commitment that night.”

“We can change the date. When are you free?”

Nathalie turned her head to stare at Marinette. Hard.

 

* * *

 

“Don’t ever do something to make us look so desperate again,” Nathalie demanded after twenty minutes of cold silence on the ride back to the office.

Marinette had been waiting for this. She was ready. “You know what looks desperate? Instant rejection from every vaguely fashion-related magazine, and like ten different celebrity agents, in a row.”

“You’re reflecting badly on both of us.”

“What are we going to do? We are burning every bridge ever for the brand and no one is going to hear that it launched!”

“Lower your voice.”

Marinette did the opposite. “How about you lower your….” Shit, she didn’t know where she was going with this. “Self? From that high horse you’re on all the time. Do you even have another plan?”

Nailed it.

Nathalie paused outside of her office.

“I have three,” she said coolly.

“What, really?” The tension Marinette held in her entire body sagged. “I can’t tell the difference between your sarcastic voice and your normal one.”

“Really.”

Marinette still couldn’t tell. “So… What’s Plan B?”

“It doesn’t involve you. Focus on finishing the technical work, I told the factory I’d send it by the end of the week.”

Nathalie opened the door to her office. Someone was sitting in it.

“Hey!” said Adrien.

“Wha—?” said Marinette.

“I have a meeting to attend now,” said Nathalie, shutting the door in Marinette’s perplexed face.

Marinette’s first impulse was to push her ear against the door. Instant regret over following that impulse came when she felt the eyes of her new assistant on her. Filled with equal parts shame and curiosity, she got back to work.

Forty minutes later, Marinette was hunched over lists of measurements (all the way down to millimetres), with an oncoming migraine. Knuckles brushed softly against her arm to get her attention. Adrien had emerged from Nathalie’s office by himself.

Marinette barely suppressed a yelp. “What are you doing _here_? You forget your phone has a GPS snitch built in?”

“I lost my phone on the way here. Really terrible.” Adrien air-quoted the word “lost.”

“You threw it out?” _He had a fucking iPhone_. “I thought you’d be in huge trouble now that your dad knows we’ve been hanging out.”

“Yeah, I actually am. My life is over. So even if he figures where I went today, it doesn’t get worse.” Adrien laughed.

It wasn’t funny.

“What was the meeting about?”

“Nathalie asked me not to tell you.”

“Oh my _god?_ ” Marinette slammed her pencil down and marched toward Nathalie’s door.

As if on cue, Adrien hooked a hand around the crook of her elbow to stop her in her tracks before she got there. “She said you would do that.”

She tugged her arm out of his grip. “Oh, did she? I should know what’s going on!”

“I know,” Adrien mouthed.

He tilted his head toward the elevator, then walked to it. Haltingly, she followed. There was a thick, almost palpable silence between them as they waited. It made Marinette tense.

Adrien chuckled beside her.

“What’s funny?”

“That thing you did for a second.” He was smiling bright, and looking at something below her waist.

Marinette looked down too. She only saw her legs. “Huh?”

She looked up, and saw Adrien raising his eyebrows at her.

“You don’t even realize you do it,” he said, eyes lighting up as if that somehow made it better.

“Do what? Someone needs to start answering my questions at some point today!”

The elevator doors opened. Marinette stood still, wondering if Adrien would whisper some secret just before they closed on him. He looked over his shoulder halfway in, then reached for her wrist to pull her in just before the doors closed.

“It’s this little leg twitch you do when, I guess, you’re nervous,” he explained.

“Oh.” It all happened so fast and now she was alone in a closed space with Adrien. Marinette was too jumbled for a proper reaction.

“And hey,” the hand at her wrist slid down to give her palm a gentle squeeze, “It meant a lot to me that you stood up for Nathalie in front of Mingyar that day.”

Something fluttered in Marinette's chest. She cleared her throat, eyes ping-ponging around the tiny space to look at anything but Adrien's face. “I mean. Mingyar destroyed me anyway. Just. More psychologically devastating levels of passive aggression in one sentence than I was ever equipped to handle.”

She made him laugh and nod. “I told you she’s much worse.”

They came to a stop and the doors opened to the narrow entry hallway, but Adrien didn’t move. They closed again. The elevator stayed still on the ground floor.

“What does Nathalie want you to do?” Marinette asked through a suddenly dry throat.

“Convincing certain photographers and other models I have some rapport with to come to the trunk show with me.”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “You _can’t_ come to the show. Your dad is going to kill you—Or me—Or both?!”

He shrugged, casually, like ruining his life was no big deal. “No, he won’t. Not me, at least.”

Marinette found it hard to believe Adrien’s life wouldn’t be a living hell with whatever Gabriel Agreste considers punishment to be. “You don’t have to sacrifice yourself because Nathalie demands it.”

“I’m repaying her. It’s my fault she left her job in the first place, she’s in this mess because she took a hit for me.”

“What did you do?”

“I turned eighteen.” Adrien leaned on the silver rails behind him, somehow so mindlessly attractive that Marinette needed to remind herself to focus. “Soon as I did, my father began drafting contracts that would appoint me as VP of the company. We thought he’d been grooming Nathalie for that role. When she had a conversation with him about whether she would be promoted beyond his assistant now… He said: We’ll see how Adrien does first.”

“She didn’t want to keep waiting for something that might never happen?”

“Or she didn’t want her future to hinge on my failure. She’s pretty ruthless in business, you know. Sabotaging me to take my place would have been remarkably easy from the position she was in. ”

Marinette knew from experience, hence why Adrien’s perspective was so hard to reconcile with the Nathalie she knew. She was quiet for a minute, letting the meaning sink in.

“So…” he pushed off from the rail, reaching for the Door Open button, “I’m not going to be able to contact you until the night of your show. You know how it is, with my dad.”

Marinette’s stomach dropped. “That’s two weeks from now.”

When she thought about the trunk show being two weeks away in terms of how much work she had left to do, Marinette hyperventilated from how little time there was in the day. But when she thought about it being two weeks before she could hear from Adrien again, it was ages.

The doors open and Adrien stepped out. “I know. Maybe after it’s over, I can—”

Marinette’s first impulse was to take him by the arm and pull him back. She was overeager and used significant more force than he’d done to her earlier, the momentum of it crashed his chest against her. She rose up to her toes and plunged his mouth to hers. To her delight, he didn’t hesitate to part his lips to let her scrape the tip of her tongue along their insides.

The sensations sent her heartbeat thundering. Nothing had ever felt this good. She was so weak and so alive at the same time, with lightning coursing through her veins. She faltered on her tip-toes, falling backwards. Adrien flung one hand out to brace against the wall behind her and another to catch her at the curve of her back. He had to hunch over to drink in the heat of her breath and she had to fist her hands in the collar of his shirt to pull herself up closer. They had two weeks to compensate for.


	3. Chapter 3

The design packages were sent off to the manufacturer and Marinette’s work at the office was done. Nathalie coldly sent her home until she would be needed for rehearsals on the day before the trunk show.

The Sancoeur aesthetic was defined by strappy cage-effect patterns and unusual cut-outs. Everything in solid black. The pièces de résistance of the fashion show were _Demeter_ , a high neckline bra creating a halterneck-style cut, revealing a striking glimpse of black lace beneath the collar of any shirt, and  _Persephone_ , a modification of Jagged Stone’s original vinyl garter-pants design to something softer, matte, more elegant than edgy. The pieces covered up more skin than you would expect from lingerie, but the designs were too daring to be considered modest.

“Really sexy, in a kind of scary way,” someone murmured over Marinette’s shoulder once the models were costumed.

It was Penny, with a folder tucked beneath one arm and two fingers held up to her ear. “Yeah, I know you like that,” she continued, and Marinette realized she was on the phone, “I’ll send you a picture. It totally aligns with your aesthetic. Nathalie is perfect.”

Marinette's top lip curled up in an involuntary grimace.

Nathalie was multitasking. She ruthlessly negotiated prices of catering down on a phone call while using snaps and points of her fingers to direct the models into their lineup order for the runway.

“I helped too,” Marinette mumbled.

Finished with her own call, Penny raised her phone to snap photos of the models. “No one knows more than me, Marinette. You’re the reason Jagged is in this.”

She hadn’t expected to be heard. “Sorry, didn’t mean to imply you don’t appreciate me. It’s not you, but I just… don’t feel appreciated.”

“Not everyone's as vocal as Jagged Stone.”

“I’m not expecting anywhere near that much, but a check in the mail is the only sign I get that I’m doing a good job, you know.”

Normally, Marinette would save these personal complaints about her boss for vent sessions with Adrien, but Adrien dutifully held up Nathalie’s request to stay away from contacting them until the trunk show. She was more than a little grumpy about that too.

“Nathalie is doing an entire company’s work almost by herself. I think she forgets to sleep most nights. It’s not surprising she forgets to say thanks,” Penny whispered, watching Nathalie end the phone call and take a moment to collect her thoughts.

“Marinette,” Nathalie snapped, making the girl jump. “Get the—”

Her boss paused upon spotting that Marinette was no longer alone, and seemed to lose track of what she was saying.

“I have more paperwork for you.” Penny took the folder out from beneath her arm and held it out to Nathalie. “Your favorite.”

“Yes, of course. Marinette, give the models their shoes and have them start to practice the walk,” she ordered before leading Penny to the area behind the stage.

Marinette busied herself unboxing shoes Nathalie had ordered and assigning them to their respective models in the dressing room.

“These are really good brands,” one of the women gasped, holding her stiletto as if it were a precious stone. “Did the entire budget go into shoes?”

Marinette smiled and shrugged as if she knew where the money for these had come from. She had no idea how they could afford thousand dollar heels. From overheard bits and pieces of Nathalie’s phone conversations, Marinette knew they could barely afford the venue for one night.

“Hey, these aren’t my size.” Sly held up the black leather ankle boots Nathalie had selected for the Persephone outfit.  

He was the only male model in the show and the youngest by at least ten years. The way the fashion world worked, it was unusual for a runway to have so many “older” women modelling. Perhaps it had been easier for Nathalie to hire unknown talent in their thirties and up because they weren’t popular choices in the fashion world, but Marinette found that the look suited the line’s style perfectly.

“Sorry, Madame Sancoeur might have ordered the wrong size,” Marinette apologized. “Hold tight and I’ll ask about them.”

She carried Sly’s boots out of the wardrobe room, following familiar voices to a corner behind the stage where Nathalie sat at a long desk against the wall with Penny’s legs dangling beside her. She could only see Nathalie’s back, the movement of her shoulders as she signed her paperwork. Penny sat upon the tabletop with her body turned toward Marinette, but her eyes were focused on Nathalie.

“If all goes well with this first design, would you do more collaborations with Jagged Stone?”

“It’s not what I had in mind for the company, but I can’t deny how much it would be beneficial to me for now.”

Marinette hovered at a distance, unsure of how to interrupt.

“You and I would be working together. Often.” Penny gently pulled a sheet of paper away from Nathalie once all the signature fields were filled.

Nathalie moved on to signing the next page without looking up. “Mhm.”

“Having lunch together?”

“It’s necessary for work.”

Penny hummed and drummed her fingertips along the edge of the table. “What about having dinner together, outside of work?”

Nathalie set the pen down with a clack and rose from her seat to hand back the final page.  “I’m always working.”

Penny’s laugh rang like chimes. “So am I.”

Marinette couldn’t see her boss’ expression, or even imagine her boss making an expression, but the pause between the two women, and Penny’s delighted reaction, suggested something could be written on Nathalie’s face other than the cold blankness Marinette was familiar with.

She cleared her throat to get their attention. When Nathalie turned around, her face was wooden as usual. She informed them of the mistake in Sly’s wardrobe.

“Nathalie makes mistakes?” Penny teased absently, carefully placing the signed contracts back in their folder.

She didn’t smile, but something in Nathalie’s body radiated amusement. Her shoulders less rigid than usual, or her eyes less cold. “He can rehearse without the boots. Focus on assisting the women in their costume changes backstage. Rehearsals are more for your practice than theirs.”

“Right,” Marinette nodded, feeling uneasy.

In the short time she had worked for Nathalie, Marinette knew well enough that it was unlike her to ignore a mistake, even temporarily. It was unlike her to make a mistake in the first place. Nathalie was too meticulous to overlook a shoe size, or let it slide later. Perhaps this was what Nathalie cracking under pressure looked like? Marinette tried to search her face for any signs of it, but her boss was inscrutable as always.

Marinette backed away while the older women exchanged their professional goodbyes. When she had turned the corner, she overheard Penny murmur, “You could toss in some encouragement for her, you know. To keep her mood up.”

She stopped in her tracks.

“I already did,” Nathalie replied. “When she came in this morning, I gave her an approving nod.”

Out of sight, Marinette could freely roll her eyes. She pressed against the wall and inched closer to its edge to listen in.

Penny laughed again. “Have you congratulated her for her work at all? You could praise her designs while you see them on the models today.”

“That’s a little excessive.”

“It’s really not. Are nods the most you got from Agreste?”

Nathalie paused. “Not even that.”

Something tugged on Marinette’s sleeve. She glanced down to see Tikki mouthing, “ _What are you doing?_ ”

Eavesdropping, clearly. Marinette sped back toward the wardrobe room before the women would turn the corner and find her. When she was at a safe distance, Tikki spoke up.

“You don’t have time to waste like that, Marinette! The event is tomorrow and you’ve never been a dresser at a fashion show before.”

“Relax, I just need to help clasp bras. How hard could it be?”

 

 

 

 

 

It was so hard.

Marinette had only seen fashion shows as a glamorous parade of beautiful people wearing beautiful things. She was not expecting it to be this nightmarishly stressful behind the scenes. The easy part was lining up the models in the order Nathalie designated for them. There were five female models who would walk out twice. One outfit change per model sounded easy in theory. In practice, it was a fucking disaster. Marinette deeply regretted all the extra straps and unusual necklines she’d added for aesthetics. These ladies walked _fast._ She had twenty seconds or less to get one woman out of her ensemble and into the next before another arrived off the runway behind her.

Under such time pressure, the models all had issues with getting tangled in extra straps of a cage-effect bra, or slipping their leg through the wrong hole in cut-out panties. The Sancoeur line was not designed to be put on in a rush. Rehearsals constantly needed to be started from the top due to the catwalk jamming when one model took ten seconds too long to walk out, affecting the entire lineup.

The first hour was a trainwreck, but the show began to run smoother the more the models became accustomed to the outfits they wore. They helped Marinette as much as she helped them. They focused on remembering the shape of their pieces, where to stick their arms and where not to. With that cooperation on their side, it didn’t take long for Marinette to nail the fifteen-second costume changes down to a science.

To help her remember who would wear what, Marinette took a polaroid of each model in her looks. At the end of the day, she pinned them in their proper order to a corkboard beside her station. Then she took a photograph of the board to study in bed that night. The only model missing from the polaroids was Sly, who wore the finale piece. She didn’t bother taking his picture because he would only walk out once, so her assistance wouldn’t be needed unless he had a wardrobe malfunction to deal with.

The backstage areas were empty when it was time to leave. Marinette would be annoyed, but not surprised, if Nathalie had left without a word on the night before the show. On her way out, she stopped to stroll along the edge of the catwalk. Some of the stage lights were still on, shining bright blue that spilled across the first couple of rows. Marinette sat at one of the front seats with a side view of the empty stage. She took a moment to imagine what the show would look like… Beautiful, she hoped. She wouldn’t be able to see it from backstage. Not while she had the responsibility of dressing everyone.

She did her best to imagine the models walking out from backstage, down the catwalk, to stop and pose at the end. At the end of the catwalk, Marinette noticed something for the first time. Bathed in cyan rays from above the stage, Nathalie was in the front and center seat. She was looking at Marinette.

“Hi,” Marinette croaked, caught by surprise. “I, uh, didn’t see you.”

“I know,” Nathalie answered.

Then she stared ahead at the stage. Marinette expected her to look at her tablet or phone at some point, to start catching up on last minute work needing to get done. But she didn’t. With bizarre serenity, she watched the vacant runway.

Marinette rose from her chair, intending to leave Nathalie alone. She clearly wanted peace and quiet at the moment. But Marinette’s legs took her to the end of the catwalk, and she sat down next to Nathalie.

“I’m nervous,” she confessed, without knowing why she felt the need to. The nerves talking?

“Don’t be. I’m ensuring your designs will do well.” Nathalie turned her head to look at Marinette as if she would say something more, but no words came out. She simply gave Marinette an “approving nod.”

“But the press and the celebrities, they turned us all down.” Marinette’s hands balled into fists over her knees. “What if noone shows up?”

“I’m sure Adrien will pull through. And you can trust that Gabriel’s enemies will send representatives from their companies to spite him.”

His enemies?

Everything clicked all at once. It dawned on Marinette why Gabriel Agreste put so much effort into stopping Nathalie’s success. It was more than being hurt that she left. She knew all of his competitors, and their secretaries. She knew every designer and corporate executive with a grudge against him, all the people in high places he’d offended at some point. She even knew _other_ designers' weaknesses, from working alongside someone close to them for so many years. She had the contact information for everyone who disliked Gabriel Agreste and didn’t know Nathalie Sancoeur enough to register a tiny new lingerie company as a threat. And she would use that against him.

“Thousands of dollars in shoes… Is that how we could afford them?”

“I didn’t pay a cent for them. Donating a pair of heels to an indie label is a small price to pay for the pleasure of pissing off a rival.”

Marinette’s fists twitched in her lap. She squeezed them harder. “This is only going to provoke Mr. Agreste!”

“I’m not scared of Gabriel,” Nathalie said firmly. “He taught me to yield results at any cost, so I’m not scared of failure either. This is going to succeed.”

Marinette took a deep breath to ease the apprehension she felt mounting. Exhaled slow. “It didn’t cost that much. I dunno about you, but I actually enjoyed the work, mostly.”

“Oh, I wasn’t talking about us. It will cost him.”

“Him?” Her already-thriving anxiety spiked off the charts. “What are you planning? Are you talking about Adrien?”

“I wouldn’t make Adrien do anything against his will.” Nathalie remained unperturbed by Marinette incoming panic attack in the seat next to her.

Marinette scoffed. “Not anymore?”

Her boss narrowed her eyes. “It was my job.”

“Do you miss him?”

This sudden question took Nathalie by surprise more than any of Marinette’s emotional bouts ever did. “Excuse me? I’ll see him tomorrow.”

“You know what I mean,” Marinette pressed on. “He’s choosing you over his dad right now, and you don’t even miss him?”

Nathalie crossed her arms in her chair. “He’s not. Adrien would crawl ten miles over broken glass to be near his father, content to bleed in his shadow.”

“I don’t know what _that_ means, but he told me he loves you.”

“That’s embarrassing.” Nathalie gathered her things and stood up.

Marinette leapt from her seat. “He said you stuck your neck out for him a bunch of times.”

“Once or twice. When it comes to affection, the kid makes mountains out of anthills.” Nathalie attempted to skirt around her, toward the exit.

Marinette sidestepped, blocking her path. “So you have some affection, huh?”

Her boss sighed deeply, rolling her eyes up toward the ceiling. “His relentless kindness and generosity in an unkind and selfish environment sneakily forced me to like him as a person. Is that what you’re trying to get me to say?”

When she looked down again, Marinette was grinning wide. Nathalie did not smile back.

“Do you want a ride home, Marinette?”

“From you?” Marinette blurted, caught off guard by the question.

“No, I’ll call you a limousine,” Nathalie said, without any change in her voice to indicate sarcasm.

Marinette followed her out of the building, somewhat uncertain of whether she should be, until the moment Nathalie unlocked the passenger side for her. Relieved, Marinette climbed into her Lexus. Five minutes into the drive home, Nathalie asked her a question.

“What else did Adrien tell you?”

Marinette hesitated, unsure if Nathalie would be upset with him for sharing personal information. “Are you worried I know something embarrassing?”

“He does know too much,” Nathalie agreed. Her eyes were fixed on the road with an unreadable expression.

“He told me why you quit,” she admitted.

“And you still had to ask if there was ‘ _affection_ ’?” Nathalie released a small huff through her nostrils. “I tossed the keys to an empire.”

It seemed inconceivably out of character for Nathalie to do when he told Marinette his theory that she would rather quit than sabotage Adrien. Hearing the bitter snap in her voice when admitting it convinced Marinette she was right. Nathalie was still coming to terms with what she’d done, or even still undecided on whether the choice was regretful or not.

“He feels guilty,” Marinette offered in his defense. “It’s why he tried so hard to get me on board with you.”

An awkward silence followed. Apparently, Nathalie had nothing to say about that.

“He told me the story about the alpac—”

Before she’d finished the sentence, Nathalie was already going “ _Ugh!_ ”

Marinette covered her mouth to stifle a giggle. “What did you end up doing with it?”

“I skinned the awful creature and left its fleece on Gabriel’s desk by nine AM the next morning.”  
  
Her laugh died so abruptly that she choked on it and coughed. “You don’t need to kill an alpaca to use its—”

“I’m aware.”

Marinette was afraid to check how serious Nathalie’s face was, so she stared straight ahead at the road with wide eyes. Her fingers drummed over her thigh in an awkward pause.

“So how long have you known Penny, anyway?” Nathalie moved on to the next topic, deliberately unbothered.

 

* * *

 

Marinette arrived at the venue an hour before the first guests filtered in. Alya, as her plus one, was there to help her get the models into their first outfits for the night. It was a little hectic to maneuver around the hair stylist, makeup artist, and nail technician simultaneously working quick to prep everyone for the runway, but the only minor disasters were Sly being late to arrive and a few hooks and eyes that had come loose after being tugged too hard at rehearsals. At least they were an easy fix. Marinette stitched them back into place in less than five minutes. She left the models ready to go well in advance and didn't worry much about Sly. He didn't need her help getting dressed and even if he arrived two minutes before the show started, he'd still have enough time to get changed into the single piece he was assigned and walk last.

She gave herself a final check in the mirror as Alya held her blazer up for Marinette to slide her arms into. She wore the navy suit jacket open with a black bustier beneath, and baggy suit trousers cinched at the waist with a pink belt. Not as feminine as Marinette preferred for an evening occasion, but flat shoes and big pockets were essential for practicality. She’d been too worried that rings or bracelets would get caught on the models during the rush to dress and ruin something, so her only accessories were a choker and a pink skinny scarf Alya draped over her shoulders. Marinette left it untied, to trail behind her as she walked.

Alya took her hand and pulled Marinette out into the pre-show cocktail party. “Let’s go meet your fans!”

She didn’t consider herself shy with crowds. As Ladybug, she was used to being swarmed by now. Yet shyness overtook her once they were among the guests and not a single one recognized her as the designer. “They’re not fans yet, no one has seen these designs except for you right now.”

She spotted Adrien socializing with a group of people too stunning not to be fellow models. He caught her eye from across the room and held the look. Marinette thought of his dad. It ruined the moment.

“I need wine,” she mumbled hoarsely, beelining straight for the bar.

“No, you don’t!” Alya pushed past her to reach it first and ordered two sodas for them.

“I’m so scared of what’s going to happen—” Marinette spoke low, trying to keep her urge break down low key.

“What’s Gabriel Agreste going to do, sneak in and pull the fire alarm?” Alya whispered back. “The fashion show is starting in thirty minutes and it’s going to blow everyone away and he can’t stop what’s going to happen when Sancoeur gets investors.”

“He’s going to know Adrien is here, he probably already knows, he—” Marinette’s hushed tone rose to a stage whisper.

“That’s Adrien’s business, babe. Stay out of it.”

As much as she wanted to take Alya’s advice, Marinette felt like being tied to everyone involved put her at the center of it. She gripped her drink with white knuckles and looked at the group of models again. Adrien wasn’t there anymore. She excused herself from Alya to look for him, but someone instantly called her name.

“Miss Dupain-Cheng?” said an older man holding a sound recorder. “I’ve been told that you made the pieces for the collection. Can I ask you a few questions?”

 

* * *

 

Alya did her the favor of cutting in to remind Marinette when there were only ten minutes left before the show and telling the interviewer to excuse her. With a grateful smile, Marinette left Alya to find her seat (where she would record the fashion show for Marinette to watch later) and weaved through attendees, doing her best to dash backstage in a publicly acceptable way. 

“Is Sly ready yet?” Marinette asked the moment she made it there.

The women were lined up in order, perfect pictures of carefully styled poise. Nathalie was there, giving them a final inspection. She did nothing to acknowledge Marinette had spoken, but the women gave her strange looks.

“You didn’t know? Sly was replaced,” one of the models revealed.

A weight dropped in Marinette’s stomach.

She barged into the wardrobe room.

Hair and Makeup busily circled around Adrien, who wore the Persephone piece. He stood up the moment she burst in, shirtless and shimmering (Makeup had dusted some serious highlighter over his collar bones). The black shorts rested on his hips as if they were made for them, neither tight nor loose; the straps running down his smooth thighs ended at the exact point over his knee where they should; the skintight leggings disappeared into the same black leather boots that had been too big for Sly.

She couldn’t breathe. She could only inhale over and over. Her bottled up worries smashed and shattered, so much worse than any of the negative scenarios she’d imagined.

Adrien was prepared to address this. Rehearsed, even. “I can explain everyth—”

“Those shoes are your size?” Marinette croaked.

He was _not_ prepared for this simple question, and stuttered clumsily over the answer. “Uh—I—What—Yeah?”

It was a stretch, but not impossible, to believe Sly and Adrien had the same measurements by coincidence. They had a pretty generic body type for male models. But the shoes fit Adrien. How long had he planned this?

“ _You are_ not _going to walk._ ” The tremble of fury in her voice caused Adrien to take a step back. Also caused Hair and Makeup to forget whichever finishing touches they were fussing over and clear the room.

“That’s not for you to decide,” said a voice from over her shoulder.

Marinette whirled around to see Nathalie shutting the door behind her with a soft click.

“You can’t—You can’t just do this,” Marinette couldn’t control her voice rising to a yell. “Gabriel is going to kill Adrien if walks out like this!”

“Adrien is an adult, he can make his own—”

“Nobody sees him as one! It’s going to be a scandal and it’s going to wreck his image.”

“He’s not an idiot, he knows the ramifications.”

“You’re leading him to his execution! He’s going to get torn apart by the media, by everyone who has ever seen him.”

Nathalie crossed her arms with exasperated weariness. “Adrien agreed to this.”

“Of course he did! You know he’d do anything for you because he cares too much and you’re exploiting it!”

“I’m standing right here, you know,” Adrien piped up.

“Yeah, and how do you feel about it now?” Marinette demanded.

Glimmering shoulders shrugged. “I’m okay with it.”

“Oh, great! You’re okay with lying to me and then being raked across the coals for her benefit! That’s great!” Her arms flailed so haphazardly as she spoke that he had to bend backward to avoid getting smacked. “It’s so good to know Adrien has finally lost his soul, just like anyone who works with you.”

Adrien raised his eyebrows, darkly filled in with makeup. “I’m sorry?”

“That you lost your soul? You should be.”

“You’re being dramatic,” said Nathalie.

“Oh! GOD.” Marinette flung herself back and her shoulders crashed against the wall behind her. She whipped her head to one side and draped an arm across her own forehead. “How unprofessional of me to let feelings outside of my own goddamn head!”

“I think she’s genuinely having a nervous breakdown,” Adrien said cautiously.

“YOU THINK?”

“No, she’s not actually this upset.” Nathalie’s head was bowed, fingers pressed to her brows in a prayer for patience. “You’re just throwing a tantrum, Marinette. You’ll get over it in a few—”

“Oh, no. _No._ That’s not working here. I am _not_ like Adrien, you don’t get to tell me how I feel.”

“Still right here,” Adrien muttered, unheard.

Unruffled, Nathalie looked at the watch on her wrist. “Then tell _yourself_ to get your hysterics under control. The show starts in five.”

Marinette pushed away from the wall, toward her. “Are you pleased Adrien’s letting you twist the knife in himself to hurt his dad? Does it make you feel important?” She stepped right into the Nathalie’s personal space, almost nose to nose. “Do you feel empowered? Do you feel like you’re getting even?”

Nathalie was going to spit fire back into Marinette’s face. She saw it burning in the other woman’s eyes and for a second wondered if losing her temper was the biggest mistake she’d ever made.

But the words got stuck in Nathalie’s mouth. She curtly announced, “I’m leaving.”

The moment the door closed behind Nathalie, the air in the room shifted. Marinette and Adrien were alone for the first time since the elevator two weeks ago, and hyper aware of it. And he was undressed, mostly.

“I’m sorry,” he said, coming close and reaching out for her.

She pushed him back with one palm. Her desires had a completely different agenda than her emotions when it came to Adrien. “I’m furious with you.”

“I’m _sorry_ ,” Adrien repeated, so sincere it made her ache.

Her fingers were splayed out on his bare chest. Her heart pounded.

“Did… Did she tell you to kiss me?”

“Do you think Nathalie tells me everything to do?”

“Yes,” Marinette answered sharply. She was calming down, but not yet calm.

His eyes cast down, unable to look her in the eye. “Not anymore. Besides, you kissed me first.”

“But did you want to? Or was it a distraction?”

Adrien backed away, letting Marinette’s hand fall through empty air. An understanding came to light.

“You’re just as manipulative as who you grew up around, you just have a sweeter face,” Marinette continued, voice soft. “And I’m starting to think you know it.”


	4. Chapter 4

When the show began, no one would guess what kind of havoc ran loose five feet behind the curtains. Frantic hands worked behind the scenes to send each model down the runway in time, blessedly occupying Marinette’s entire focus as she flounced around with bobby pins clamped between her teeth. Adrien stayed out of her periphery, even though she knew he was in the room. He didn’t come near her until it was almost his turn to walk. She fumbled with a bra clasp, suddenly reminded of him, and ended up having to safety pin it shut to get the model out several seconds too late. Once the last woman disappeared through the curtain, only Adrien was left. He had ten seconds.

“Nathalie only asked me to convince you not to take my dad’s internship.”

Marinette refused to look behind her. She only made a snort of disbelief and stared at the curtain waving.

“And to make sure you were okay. She was afraid you would quit.”

Marinette closed her eyes. Only a few seconds.

“That’s all,” Adrien pleaded in the last moment before his cue to walk.

His professionalism, or loyalty to Nathalie, or whatever, outweighed his desperation for an answer. He still walked. As he passed, Marinette stubbornly turned her attention toward picking up clothes the models had shed and left on the floor during the madness between changes.

Weeks of grinding out designs through long, stressful days culminated here. One event that only lasted ten minutes and Marinette did not get to personally attend. The last seconds of it were the only part she would have a chance to see. She might have been too angry to look. The crowd made an audible gasp in perfect unison moments after Adrien stepped out, when they recognized who it was they were seeing so scantily clad. Marinette couldn't resist pulling the curtain back a couple of inches to see.

Nathalie’s taste for drama came through in the way she’d instructed Adrien to walk the runway. It was not a strut or prowl, but a cortège. Stage lights cast dramatic shadows along slight shifts of his shoulder blades with each step (almost feline in their movement), under the lean lines of symmetrical musculature running parallel on either side of his spine, and within two sharp dimples chiseled right into where the curve of his ass began. Marinette scowled in frustration.

The audience watched the show in posh silence before this point, but now had forgotten all sense of etiquette. They straight up chattered, not even whispering, unable to look away from the electrifying sight of former child star Adrien Agreste styled like this. Camera lights strobed in desperation to capture every moment as Adrien hit his pose at the end, sunk his weight to his right, sunk it to his left. He did a half-turn and she could see his face now, see the way he lowered his lashes and lifted them, slow and coy. She _heard_ the heart-wrenching effect it had on the crowd, gasps of ecstasy just from _looking_ at him. This was how he controlled people, the only way he'd learned how.

Marinette let go of the curtain before he completed the turn and she had to see him face on, coming to her. She snuck out of the building during the thunderous applause of the finale.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

Overnight, the Sancoeur brand became a household name. Even Parisians with no interest in fashion couldn't resist a taste of the scandal. Marinette’s phone blew up with texts from old friends and distant relatives who spotted her name briefly mentioned in articles about the show. No one bothered with congratulating her work, only astonishment at the stunt with Adrien. _Wholesome Adrien, respectable Adrien, what happened to him?,_ they asked Marinette over and over again, as if it were her responsibility. As if her designs were the corrupting influence. As if she hadn’t had a crisis asking the same questions minutes before the show.

She wanted to wash her hands of this thing, pretend it never happened. She had an overwhelming fear that this would follow her forever. Ten years down the line, she would arrive at an interview and be asked about the Sancoeur show. Not even about Marinette’s part in it, but about _Adrien’s._

Jagged Stone and Penny hadn't been present for the show due to tour scheduling, but they invited her for a celebratory dinner once they returned to Paris. Not even Nathalie had done that. Marinette would have rejected her if she offered, but still felt resentment for not receiving the gesture. Jagged bought out the entire back room of a bougie restaurant at the center of town, where he, Penny, and Marinette occupied one booth.

Marinette ranted about the entire situation for at least 45 minutes to Jagged Stone. “Why wouldn't they _tell_ me?”

“Maybe Nathalie thought that knowing ahead of time would put excess pressure on you,” said Penny.

“I was _used._ ” While Marinette spoke, Penny deftly moved a glass of water out of range from her flailing hands.

Jagged nodded. “Yeah, not cool.”

“From Nathalie’s perspective, I can see how it would look like a wiser move to tell you at the last minute when you only have time for one panic attack, versus suffering many attacks over the decision in the weeks leading up to the event.”

Marinette’s eyes slitted as she listened to Penny. “What is it with you and Nathalie?”

“What,” said Jagged Stone in English.

“Nothing,” said Penny. “Shit, no, don't tell her I said that.”

“What?” said Jagged Stone, louder.

“Stay on topic,” Penny ordered. She snapped a finger. “Marinette.”

“Right!” Jagged slammed his drink down. “Marinette, why do you feel used?”

“Because Adrien just sweet talked me into working for her and I ate it all up like an idiot? I thought he was coming to see me all the time because he wanted to be near me. He was just, I don't know, doing Nathalie’s bidding.”

“Why couldn't he be doing both?” Penny asked. “Besides, maybe Nathalie was using him with good intentions. And he was doing that to you.”

“Manipulating is still being a dick, even with good intentions.” Marinette felt hypocritical saying it, but being occasionally guilty of using that specific brand of rationalizing for herself didn’t make it any easier to be on the receiving end of it. “Are they even that good? Nathalie is just grabbing for money after quitting her job and Adrien knows that.”

“Yeah!” Jagged Stone chimed in after feeding Fang a scrap from his plate beneath the table. “Real cute that those two made some ‘ _ride-or-die_ ’ career suicide pact together, but they never asked Marinette if she was okay with it.”

Penny twirled her pasta around its fork without any intention to bite it. “You don’t know Nathalie, Jag. She would never ask you how you're feeling.”

“So?” said Marinette and Jagged together.

“If your feelings mattered to her, she would rather hear about them from someone else. Secretly.”

She was so clearly biased toward Nathalie that Marinette had to use every ounce of self-control to restrain from rolling her eyes. “If.”

“They do.”

“What makes you so sure?”

Penny put her fork down with a gentle clink. “Did Nathalie ever ask you about me, Marinette?”

“Um, yeah?”

She grinned at the answer. “She asked me about you too, while you were working for her. And she keeps asking me about you.”

“When?” Marinette asked at the same time that Jagged cried “What?!”

Penny tucked a strand of dyed hair behind one ear. She (unconvincingly) tried to sound casual when she admitted, “I’ve been with her the last couple of days.”

“You mean since we _got here?_ ” said Jagged.

Marinette’s jaw dropped. “Are—Oh my god, are you having a thing with Nathalie?”

“You started dating and you didn't tell me?” Jagged held a hand to his chest, deeply offended.

Penny held composure in the face of their horrified astonishment. “Dating is a strong word for her.”

Jagged leaned toward her, whispering noisily, “What's happening then?”

“I mean. We agreed to be exclusive.” Penny shrugged one shoulder, fighting off a smile. “She pretty much laid out some extensive terms for me and I agreed.”

Marinette still struggled to process this information, but it was so like Nathalie to make a contract for a relationship. “And I complained to you about—I can't even imagine—God, _dating’s too strong_ —What is that even like?”

“Yeah, what's it like?” Jagged echoed the question, eager for juicy details.

Penny turned to him, clearly comfortable sharing intimate details between each other. “Look, I don't know, I think we're in a holding pattern.”

“Please stop,” begged Marinette, regretting her curiosity.

Penny jumped slightly, as if she’d forgotten Marinette was there for a moment. “Yeah, don't tell her I said any of that either. The fact is we can ask each other what Nathalie's thinking all day long and we’ll never know.”

Marinette shouldn’t have been surprised that even someone almost-but-not-exactly-dating Nathalie couldn’t make sense of her feelings. “It doesn't explain Adrien. He was an open book and she turned him into someone I don’t even recognize.”

Penny raised a pierced eyebrow. “You think she shaped him that way just now? He was raised by someone much worse than Nathalie.”

“What are you saying?” Marinette asked.

Penny gave Jagged a meaningful look. Whatever it meant, Jagged Stone seemed to pick up.

He scooted toward Marinette and explained with delicacy, “Don’t you think you might’ve been in love with a persona?”

“No,” she replied instantly. “I went to school with Adrien, I’ve known him since—”

“Did you know he was close to Nathalie?”

“I—No...”

Jagged reached over the table to pet Marinette’s hand, as if in consolation. “I’ve met people who claim they’ve loved me for years, but lose interest the moment I start to show signs of reciprocation.”

Marinette huffed defensively. “I didn’t stop liking Adrien because he stopped being unattainable!”

“It’s not that. I just think you’re angry at him for straying off the script you’d spent years writing for him.”

Marinette snatched her hand back from Jagged. “What? He tricked me, _that’s_ why I’m angry!”

“Not saying he isn’t a dick! I’m not on Adrien Agreste’s side. I would punch him in his gorgeous face if you wanted and feel good about it.”

After some difficulty holding it in, Marinette smiled despite being offended.

Jagged Stone took a hesitant pause before adding, “I just kinda know what it’s like for him, too. You could recite every word that an Adrien you designed would say, and it’s heartbreaking that he doesn’t know those lines as well as you.”

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

Sometimes she thought about calling Adrien to tell him off. She tried once, but the line was disconnected. He tossed his new iPhone out again before the fashion show, probably. She would imagine herself sending a text to him about how upset she was. Never actually sent it because there was no number for him to receive it from. Then she would get mad when days passed and Adrien didn’t send an apology text in response to the bitter one she never wrote in the first place.

She was having one of these moments when her phone lit up, but not with a text from Adrien. It was an email from his father’s new assistant.

_Dear Miss Dupain-Cheng,_

_It has come to light that the nature of the relationship between Adrien and yourself is less than professional. Call me promptly to discuss the terms of their release._

_Best wishes,  
Mingyar!_

Attached to the email: Pixelated stills of security camera footage. Marinette pinning Adrien to the wall and kissing him deeply.

Oh, right. She did that.

Marinette scrambled to call the number at the bottom of the message with trembling fingers.

A familiar bubbly voice answered. “Gabriel Agreste’s suite, this is Ming—”

“I’m not here,” a distant male voice snapped.

“—yar. To whom am I speaking?”

“The answer’s no,” said (presumably) Mr. Agreste.

“Um. This is Marinette Dup—”

“Yes, of course.” said Mingyar.

“Tell them I’m already dead,” Mr. Agreste grumbled, distantly.

“It’s not press, it’s Miss Dupain-Cheng.”

“Fine, I’ll take it. Go away.”

Marinette froze at the corner of her room with the phone pressed to her ear, too frightened to pace, listening to sounds of the phone being passed between hands and a door shutting.

“Hello,” said Mr. Agreste, voice as intimidating in its blankness as Nathalie’s.

A layer of humiliation coiled itself around Marinette’s terror. “I—I received the pictures.”

“And?”

Marinette held her breath. Did he expect her to have something to fire back?

“I’ve got nothing,” she confessed, pathetically. “I'm nothing like Nathalie, I just work for her. I didn't want anything to do with this.”

“And yet you took part in all of this. I warned both of you about Nathalie.”

Marinette clenched her eyes shut and begged, “Please just tell me what I have to do to stop those pictures from being seen.”

“Oh, it's too late for that.”

“No? What do you mean?” Her stomach sank every moment with cold cramps that physically hurt.  “Your message said I could discuss terms. You didn't even give me a chance—”

“I gave you chance after chance to do the right thing. I've been quite willing to forgive and you still chose to dig your grave.”

An understanding crept up on her of the kind of the man Gabriel Agreste, a long-time a personal hero, actually was. The lead in Marinette’s gut shifted to her spine instead. “Why would you shove your own son into that grave with me?”

“You’ve read enough headlines to know he has already fallen from grace. Now, I didn't say there isn't still redemption in it for you both.”

“You said the pictures are already out, your forgiveness is _worthless,_ ” she argued through gritted teeth.

“Nothing of mine is worthless.” Marinette mouthed a silent “ugh” on her end of the line while Gabriel drawled on, “You’re not realizing my forgiveness is more valuable to your professional reputation than you can imagine. Here is what you will do for it: You will convince Adrien to come back home. Then you will both apologize publicly.”

“How do we benefit at all from doing either of those, exactly?”

“Adrien gets to show he is sorry for his questionable choices, I get to show that I am a forgiving father, and my approval of your relationship with my son frees you from the slutshaming bound for you. Everyone is redeemed and the story loses its intrigue.”

“We're not even in a relationship!”

“Do leave that part out of the apology speeches. It does you no favors.”

He snickered into the phone. Marinette’s eyebrows scrunched together at the sound. Gabriel Agreste could not possibly _snicker_ , could he?

He clicked his tongue and snapped, wearily, “Mingyar, get off the line.”

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

Marinette called Penny. No answer. She needed someone to tell her what to do. She needed air. She climbed to her balcony and called again. No answer.

She threw up into a potted plant, then pawed its leaves in apology to it as she dialed Penny thrice more.

Marinette left her five barely coherent voicemails in a row, then became desperate enough to call Jagged Stone. Jagged never answered calls.

Halfway through an autocorrect-ridden, almost illegible cry for help via text message to Alya, an incoming call interrupted. Marinette heaved a sigh of relief—that she abruptly cut short. It was not Penny Rolling’s name, nor Jagged Stone’s written across her screen. It was “Jesus Fucking Christ” calling.

Marinette clenched her her jaw and her phone for a moment, letting it ring. Then she answered. “What, Nathalie?”

She nearly apologized, but shut that impulse down before the words made it out. Nathalie was not her boss anymore and Marinette needed to _stop being scared of her._ A slight pause on the line. She knew Nathalie was taken aback as well, even if she did nothing to express it. Odd how Nathalie forced those around her to telepathically discern her feelings somehow after spending enough time in the same office.

“You’re fired,” said Nathalie.

Marinette gaped at the night air, too concerned about Mr. Agreste to care about this. “I figured?”

“Correctly, but it was never discussed. So there’s your closure on that.”

“I didn’t need any clo—Jesus fucking Christ, did you call because you know about the photos?”

“Yes. I was about to bring that up.”

Marinette nodded at no one, rather hysterically. “Right after you fired me.”

“I’ll admit that was a reflex. It slipped out. Let’s move on from it. We have to talk. I’m waiting outside for you.”

What? Marinette tip-toed to the edge of her roof and peered over the bannister to the street below. The headlights of a familiar-looking Lexus beamed at the corner.

She never wanted to see her again, much less speak to her. But Nathalie seemed to be the only person in France who was not afraid of Gabriel Agreste. And Marinette felt more betrayed by him than Nathalie or Adrien at the moment.

Two minutes later, Marinette climbed into Nathalie’s passenger seat. “Surprised you didn’t send Adrien.”

“I tried that first, but he insisted you wouldn’t want to speak to him.” Nathalie kept the car parked at the bakery’s curb.

He was right. Marinette glowered at her former boss. “I don’t want to speak to either of you. Ever.”

Nathalie returned a deadpan stare. “You’re both so dramatic.”

“You keep calling me that, as if you and Mr. Agreste are any better. Much worse, actually!” Marinette threw her hands up while gesticulating and knocked her knuckles against the window with a sharp thud. To suppress a flinch in front of Nathalie, even though it stung, she kept talking. “Your theatrics have a body count!”

Nathalie kept the same level voice and expression she spoke with every day of her life, probably since she was born. “No, they don’t.”

Marinette brushed her knuckles over her jeans. “Fine, I was being dramatic there. But you are worse.”

“I wasn’t going to argue that part.”

“Well—Good,” Marinette faltered, unsure of how to behave if Nathalie wasn’t going to argue. She went with spilling as much as she could now while Nathalie wasn’t in the mood to attack it. “Because I put my all into the designs I made for you, and you knew the controversy would overshadow everything about them. It was bad enough to get stuck in the shadow of this, and now I have to deal with Gabriel Agreste trying to ruin _me, personally,_ after accepting that he can’t get to you.”

Marinette had fantasized about this rant in imagined arguments several times, so the words came out easy. Saying it out loud made it even more overwhelming, somehow. Marinette didn’t stand a chance.

Nathalie nodded and turned her attention to a street lamp directly ahead of them.

“I regret certain steps I took,” she said, deliberate and detached, like reading lines.

The fakeness of it would have sparked deeper annoyance in Marinette at one point, but she’d learned how to handle Nathalie by now.

“You were right,” Nathalie added, deeply interested in the lamp outside.

“I was?” Marinette said, followed by instant regret over not ending the sentence with a period. “I’ve been throwing a lot of stuff out there. You should be more specific.”

Nathalie stared out her window. “I hoped Adrien would hate me after this. I tried, for his own good.”

“You wouldn’t have to try for most people,” Marinette scoffed. “Adrien might be the only person who adores you, apparently unconditionally.”

Nathalie nodded. “It would have ended neatly if he could react like you did. If he could just resent me, he would’ve gone home and I would’ve gone on.”

The thought crept up on Marinette that perhaps Nathalie didn’t know how to be loved. “I’m sure he’s already forgiven you anyway.”

“Of course he has. I’ve done nothing to deserve forgiveness and he gives it away like it’s inconsequential.” It was hard to make out Nathalie’s face in the moonlight and her voice was inscrutable as ever.

“Not that I agree you deserve that forgiveness,” Marinette said. “But Adrien does think its his fault you quit your job.”

“I know. And on some level, I was resentful of Adrien for forcing me into making a choice he had no say in.” As she spoke, Nathalie’s head turned to follow a pedestrian coming up the sidewalk.

“That’s not how it works. He didn’t force you into caring about his future. Which, by the way, if you cared so much, why did you let him walk?”

Nathalie didn’t answer. She focused so intensely on the pedestrian that Marinette couldn’t help staring at him as well. He slipped a hand into his pocket and pulled out something cylindrical, then unzipped his coat to free something heavy hanging around his neck. It was a camera and lens.

Marinette gasped. “There’s a photographer at _my house._ ”

Nathalie was already shifting the car into drive before she spoke and they drove away before the photographer could put his camera together. Marinette put her feet up on the seat and pressed her knees to her chest, curling into herself. She pushed her palms against her eyelids and asked miserably, “Why did I ever do this?”

“It’s because I got sucked into the game with Gabriel,” Nathalie answered.

“Huh?” Marinettes hands dropped from her face.

“He provoked me and I played right into his hands.” She sighed, eyes fixed on the road ahead. “Gabriel knows me. He wanted to show Adrien I would put myself before him and I proved that right.”

Despite her anger at Adrien, Marinette pitied him. Between Gabriel and Nathalie’s petty war, both of their plots counted on Adrien being hurt to meet their ends.

Marinette took a deep breath and released it in a long, exasperated sigh. “God, Nathalie, I thought you were smarter than this. I thought you knew _Gabriel_ better than this.”

“Excuse me.”

“You honestly think it’s impossible to hurt him without going through Adrien? What did you think the entire reason he’s so obsessed with your failure is?”

“Because he’s vengeful and he’s… heartless,” she answered, the most unsure Marinette had ever heard her.

She shook her head. “Wrong. He has a heart that you stabbed when you left.”

Nathalie opened her mouth, then closed it several times. Eventually, she said, “You don’t know him. Gabriel doesn’t let others come close enough to hurt him.”

This was like dealing with a child. Marinette tilted her head back against her seat. “Why does Adrien love you?”

“Because I’m the only person he’s been around consistently for the past five years.” She attempted to be dismissive, but as soon as she said it, Nathalie’s lips tightened into a subtle grimace that suggested she caught Marinette’s drift. In a different way, Adrien’s father imposed isolation on himself just as much as he did for his son. “That’s ridiculous. Gabriel couldn’t possibly take it that personally, we didn’t have anything personal.”

“He certainly learned that the hard way.”

Silence, tense and thick, filled the car like steadily rising water.

“You broke Adrien’s heart when you left too, you know,” Marinette said. “The difference is he reacts by crawling after you and his father by shooting you down.”

Nathalie said nothing. Nothing at all for the remainder of the drive.

She lived in a glamorous, swanky building that Marinette wondered how she could continue affording with only a startup company. She must’ve had an impressive amount of savings from her old job, but this lifestyle wasn’t sustainable if the brand didn’t massively take off. At least she had the foresight or luck to pick a building within a gated community, so no photographers would be able to come near her home. Nathalie pushed her house key into its lock, then paused.

“You could sleep here if you don’t want to go home,” she said.

“What, on the couch?”

“I’m not staying here.”

“Oh. Give Penny a hug for me.”

The “caught red-handed” look on Nathalie’s face was almost worth the pain of getting into this situation. Seeing her make expressions unintentionally was a rare delight that Marinette now had acquired a taste for. It only took a couple of seconds for Nathalie to put her face back into standard formation.

“Besides,” she countered as she turn the key and pushed her door open, “Adrien sleeps on the couch.”

Marinette's grabbed the handle, closing her hand over Nathalie’s, and tugged it shut. “A—Adrien is in here?”

“You knew he didn't go back to Gabriel, did you think he lived under a bridge now?”

“No, I just,” Marinette sputtered off, making sounds that did not even slightly resemble words.

Two weeks ago, Nathalie would have ordered her to form a sentence. This time, she only requested, “Please talk to him.”

Marinette merely gaped. Even though talking to him was the thing she’d fixated on most in the days since the show, she hadn’t _prepared_ for it. Nathalie took the lack of a reply as an agreement and pushed the door back open, despite Marinette still hanging on.

Adrien was hovering right there at the entrance, probably startled by the door rattling back and forth. His mouth fell open at the sight of Marinette jostling in and disentangling her hand from Nathalie’s. Nathalie gave her back a gentle push that sent her stumbling into the apartment. She stared at Adrien, and he stared back, until Nathalie muttered an impatient “Goodnight” and snapped the door shut behind her.

“Hey,” Adrien finally said, stiff and awkward. “I didn't know you and Nathalie were… I guess, talking.”

“We weren't,” Marinette corrected instantly. “She came out of the blue tonight.”

Adrien’s head tilted to the side. “Did something happen?”

“There's press essentially stalking me because your dad is trying to ruin my life.”

“God, I’m sorry.”

Marinette nodded bitterly. “Yeah. All because of you, you know, because you can’t just suck up your pride and go back home.”

“I—It’s not like that, Marinette. I would go back in a second, but I can’t.”

“What do you mean you can’t? I spoke to your father today and it’s obvious—”

“You spoke to him _today?_ ” Adrien looked angry at her, suddenly.

“Yeah, his new assistant told me to call him and I—”

“He _wanted_ to talk to you. Oh my god.” The last bit of Adrien’s sentence got muffled by his hands as he brought them up over his face, then slid them up, smoothing over his hair as he took a deep breath. More calm now, he explained, “I’ve had complete silence from him since the show. He doesn’t answer my calls. I _tried_ to go home and Mingyar _wouldn’t let me in_. The closest I’ve come to a word from him was hearing from his lawyers.”

“Lawyers?” Marinette’s brows furrowed as she struggled to piece together what the hell Gabriel expected of Adrien.

“Yeah. He’s suing me,” he said with a short, dry laugh. Then added, “Sorry, I should show you the apartment.”

With a half-hearted wave to come along, Adrien slipped away into Nathalie’s living room. Marinette followed him, but wouldn’t let the subject drop. “Suing for what?”

“He owns my image, always has. I’m in an exclusive contract with the brand. I couldn’t model for other companies without him signing off on it first.”

She was listening, but her face did nothing to show it. Now that she was in the middle of Nathalie’s living space, she couldn’t stop staring at it. Couldn’t tear her eyes off the deep wine paint over the walls the walls and dark, heavy curtains. The furniture was romantic in style, all curls and waves at the edges, and mostly black with red accents.

“The opposite of my blindingly white house, right?” Adrien said, faintly amused.

“God, does she sleep in a coffin too?”

He smiled at that. “She’s not here, we can check.”

“Nope.” Marinette dropped onto the couch. “That’s alright.”

Despite Marinette’s honest curiosity about what the hell kind of room a person like that would sleep in, there was something wrong and uncomfortable about picturing anything Nathalie did outside of bossing Marinette around. Nathalie said Marinette could sleep there. Yeah, right. She’d rather pull an all-nighter right here on this couch.

“You want a tea or something?”

“A coffee,” Marinette said, knowing there would be plenty in that kitchen.

“Uh, it’s pretty late.”

“Yeah.”

Adrien had concern written all over his face, but went off to make her a coffee anyway. Marinette kicked off her shoes and pulled her legs up on the couch so that she could turn her body and watch Adrien through the open door to the kitchen. He was going through this simple task amazingly slow. Marinette wondered if he’d gone his whole life until this point without ever having to serve a coffee himself. She definitely saw him look for instructions on the coffee cannister. Eventually, he figured it out and brought her a mug of mediocre cafe au lait. She took a sip. It was alright for a first try, she supposed.

Adrien took a seat at the far end of the couch, probably thinking Marinette would be annoyed if he presumed she wanted him any closer. He was probably right. “Just so you know, I think you’re right about me, you know. I thought a lot about that.”

Second person she heard that from tonight and it did help her feel slightly better. But she was still bitter. “Glad you do, but I think you’d still throw me under the bus for Nathalie again even after being enlightened about yourself.”

“Nathalie’s my family.”

“No, she’s not. We both made a huge mistake in trusting her.”

“No.”

Marinette raised her eyebrows. “That’s it? Just no? Nathalie convinced you to wreck your entire career because she wants this to make you hate her. She’s terrified by how much you love her, so she wants to ruin it.”

“Aw.” Adrien actually said _Aw_ and Marinette was this close to strangling him. “I know everything’s awful for me right now, but I needed this. I don’t even like modeling. She’s probably the only person on earth who knew that.”

Her mouth hung open in disbelief. After a moment trying to make sense of him, she supposed Adrien didn’t have the luxury to value his own trust properly when his only other family was Gabriel Agreste.

“Good to know you’re getting freedom or whatever out of this, but all I’m getting is a huge controversy that’s gonna overshadow everything I do from now on. Assuming I can ever show my face in a fashion studio again after whatever your dad has planned for me. Did you seriously think you could just do that?”

“Yeah,” Adrien said candidly, immediately.

Marinette gaped.

“It’s weird. I always saw myself as, like, some beacon of goodness and never questioned it. Obviously, it’s only because Nathalie and my dad set the bar so low when it comes to having a moral compass.”

Her mouth slanted off to the side of her face. “Do you want an award for not being as terrible as you could’ve been?”

“No, I’m glad you said what you did. I don’t know what in hell I would be without friends like you.”

Being harsh to Nathalie was satisfying because Nathalie didn’t care. Marinette was starting to believe the woman felt more comfortable with it than she would with tender understanding of her apology. Doing the same to Adrien felt like kicking a cat, even if that cat had scratched her first.

“I just want to apologize. Which I know you don’t have to accept, but it’s really important to me that you know I wasn’t acting.”

“I believe you.”

Maybe he’d made a mistake and he was a good enough person to know how to grow from it. Most people were, in Marinette’s experience. Better to learn late than never that being less terrible than Gabriel Agreste was not solid enough grounds to make Nathalie Sancoeur morally reliable. Marinette reached for Adrien’s hand and gave it an amiable squeeze. A tentative truce.

“So… Did my dad say anything about me?”

She winced, because it was nothing like what Adrien was hoping for. “Well, speaking of apologies…”

She told him his dad wanted one from each of them. She told him about the pictures. She told him about how she couldn’t fathom looking her own parents in the eye after this, let alone the cold-blooded terror Adrien called a dad. Adrien seemed equally mortified at the thought, at least. He was screaming into a throw pillow. Marinette didn’t think she had it in her to laugh under such pressure, but she did.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

She woke up to the smell of warm batter. It took her blinking eyes a moment to register that it was morning at all, because the inside of Nathalie’s apartment was still mostly dim. The heavy curtains were still drawn shut, letting only a sliver of bright sunlight pour in from the crack beneath. Utensils scraped against each other in the kitchen. Marinette felt heavy, groggy. She was lying on her side across the couch with her legs tangled up in Adrien’s, who drooled into the armrest at the other end. If Adrien wasn’t in the kitchen… The scent of fresh breakfast crept up on Marinette in time with a sense of dread.

“Here.” Nathalie pushed a belgian waffle in her face.

Marinette scrambled to sit up and take the plate, accidentally kicking Adrien a few times. “Is… Is that for me?”

“No, I just can’t eat until someone breathes on my food.”

Marinette took the plate. There was chantilly on it. “Cut me some slack, I just woke up. And—thank you.”

Nathalie, fully dressed and groomed already, went back to the kitchen. Adrien stretched himself awake beside Marinette. He looked at her waffle with half-lidded eyes and made an appreciative “mmm” noise, utterly unsurprised.

“Nathalie made this,” Marinette whispered. He didn’t react. She whispered again, “Why?”

“We don’t have a personal chef here,” Nathalie said, circling around the couch to pass Adrien his own plate.

“Thanks, Nathalie,” he yawned and rose from his seat.

Marinette’s eyes followed him taking the plate to the dining table. Everything felt weird. “I didn’t think you were the type to cook for someone else.”

“And why not?”

Marinette withered beneath Nathalie’s flat stare. “Because… I don’t know.”

“Eat fast, we’re starting in twenty.”

Marinette looked toward Adrien, who beckoned her to the table. She got up and followed suit.

“Faster than that,” Nathalie snapped at them before Marinette had even sat down.

“Uh, what are we starting?” Marinette asked. It was too early for this.

“I wrote your apology speeches. You’re going to memorize them.”

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

Marinette didn’t want to know how Nathalie casually arranged a press conference in one day. She didn’t need to know. It did explain why she would casually give Marinette orders with almost impossibly tight time limits and roll her eyes when Marinette whined about it. When they arrived at the conference room of Gabriel Agreste’s office building, she could practically see the reporters’ eyes glowing with hunger like wolves in the night.

Adrien, Marinette, and Nathalie lined up along a small platform with a podium in the middle. Mr. Agreste himself was there, standing off to the side and looking quite imposing with his arms crossed behind his pencil-straight back. Next to him, completely unruffled, was Penny. It calmed Marinette slightly to think about how awkward _that_ was for Nathalie.

Adrien went up first. The apologies Nathalie wrote were exactly as contrived as one would expect from her. Adrien’s started out with an explanation of his longtime friendship with Marinette as a childhood classmate and longer friendship with Nathalie as his manager. He was “sorry” for making an irresponsible decision to model for Sancoeur and “regretted” his unwise choices as a role model. 

Then he stepped aside for Marinette to take her turn. Her speech wasn’t much different. She kept glancing at Mr. Agreste, irritated that he was going to win, that he was getting everything he wanted. 

Except he hadn’t. Not really. Nathalie had chosen Adrien over working for him. Marinette had chosen Nathalie over working for him. His own son had chosen Nathalie over him. Gabriel had all the power in the world, and all to himself because he’d pushed everyone away. He forced them to put on this show to make him appear as if they were at his mercy, but the way he looked at Adrien made it obvious that he was at theirs. He just wanted a way to keep his pride and his son at the same time because Adrien could drag his father through fire and Gabriel would still love him. Which Gabriel probably found humiliating now that Nathalie and Adrien had used that against him and he _still_ fell apart without his son. Suing him and telling Mingyar to keep him out of the house, it was all a pathetic defense mechanism. He froze Adrien out because it terrified him.

Marinette would never have understood this if she hadn’t learned to understand Nathalie. Now everything was clearer to her than either of those emotionally stupid so-called “adults,” probably.

“It’s no use,” Marinette abruptly cut off her recitation of Nathalie’s speech. “Gabriel can sink any rising brand with a snap of his fingers. I’m sure the press knows exactly why Sancoeur got pushed into this corner after getting so far despite the odds. We put up a good fight, but it wasn’t a sustainable one.”

With a deep breath, Marinette skipped to the last line of the statement Nathalie gave her. “Which is why the Sancoeur brand is calling off its launch.”

Chairs creaked in the uncomfortable silence. Several reporters nodded, giving the impression they’d been told a long time ago that Sancoeur was rigged to fail. Marinette lowered her head and backed away from the podium. She shuffled back to where Nathalie and Adrien stood.

Nathalie put a hand on her shoulder, an alarming action. “Thank you, Marinette. You're… a solid coworker.”

Marinette mouth fell open and her lips parted in awe.

“Nathalie, oh my god, you’ve never said anything like this to me before.” Marinette was tearing up.

“Jesus, this is why,” she said, stepping away from her. 

Marinette whirled on Adrien, who was smiling wide at both of them. “Did you tell her to say that?” 

“Maybe.”

“I thought a little encouragement might convince you to try this again,” said Nathalie.

“What?” Marinette and Adrien said together.

A mysterious smirk flickered across Nathalie’s face so quickly that Marinette might have imagined it. She stepped up to the podium. “There is one more point that needs to be addressed.”

Reporters who had started gathering their belongings or chattering with their colleagues froze. An apology from Nathalie hadn’t been part of the deal.

“After the closure of Sancoeur,” Nathalie said. “I won’t pursue starting a new brand.”

Mr. Agreste wore a smirk. Penny had a hand over her mouth.

“Instead, I will be working as a Creative Director under the upcoming luxury branch of Jagged Stone’s existing brand.”

The room exploded in gasps. Mr. Agreste’s smirk had fallen into an open-mouthed frown. Penny’s hand had also fallen to reveal a grin. 

“It’s tentatively named StoneCoeur to separate it from Jagged Stone t-shirts and hoodies sold at consumer level. You heard it here first, now my Vice President, Penny Rolling, will answer any questions you may have.”

Nathalie turned her head to nod to Penny. Then, she outright smirked at Gabriel. Jagged Stone was larger, richer, and more influential than Gabriel Agreste would ever be. When Marinette introduced his manager to Nathalie, she’d handed her the ammunition to not only defend herself from Gabriel’s influence in the industry, but enough to make him back off. In hindsight, everything surrounding Sancoeur looked like a warning shot. If that’s what Nathalie could do with no advantage, what was she capable of with one of the biggest names in the world?

Something uncomfortably close to admiration for her stirred inside of Marinette.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

Adrien still went home with his father after the press conference, in the same car and everything. Marinette used to worry about the controlling environment Adrien was kept under. Now? Not so much. She had a feeling Adrien had given Mr. Agreste enough reason to fear him in return. 

After they waved goodbye to him from the ritzy entrance to the Agreste business headquarters, she turned to Nathalie. “It was kind of sweet of you to set this up so that Adrien would still make up with his dad right before you dropped the bomb on his own press conference.”

“Hm? It was actually Mingyar who arranged everything. She really cares about him.” Nathalie was looking down, focused entirely on scrolling through her phone, looking at nothing in particular.

Marinette laughed. “I can tell she does.”

Orange light from the descending sun splashed a warm glow over their backs as they went down the steps together, walking away from the corporate building that was once so important to them.

**Author's Note:**

> did she really end this with a parks and rec joke? yes.
> 
> the idea for jagged stone's design is based on [these ridiculous pants](https://68.media.tumblr.com/295c85674b85234851cfc405666238db/tumblr_og1txza3dR1uh86f4o1_1280.png) and nathalie's designs are based on agent provocateur
> 
> if you want, you can listen to the [playlist](http://8tracks.com/thebeatmesa/heartless) i made for this story's writing insp


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